rr 



-. 









LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
TX&W 

Chap. Copyright No.. 

Shelf„_jLV_4 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



GEMS 



COMPILED 



5. VI 



MARY E. VIBI 
it 



BOSTON 
J. STILMAN SMITH & CO. 



s^Sii of : 

i OCT 18 18 



TWO COPIES RECEIVED 



b** 1 



fH 



Copyright, 1S97 

BY 

MARY E. VIBBERT 



BOSTON 



PREFACE. 



" T^HE most notable quality of such books 
is their suggestiveness. They bring 
their thought and give it to us, not as men 
bring their treasures to a warehouse, laying 
them down there upon the floor as on a for- 
eign, unrelated substance, but as you bring 
the spark of fire to a pile of wood which has 
within itself the power of burning and turning 
into fire. It is not the fulness of their hands 
which makes them welcome : it is the deli- 
cacy and discrimination of the finger which 
they lay upon some spring in us and set 
some of our nature free. . . . Some 
suggestive word out of this book will fall 
upon a score of lives some morning, and will 
touch the key of each. Each will be better 
for it, but how differently ! One will do bet- 
ter trading; another will do better teaching; 
another's household life will be more pure 
and lofty. The fire falls upon a hundred 



IV PREFACE. 

substances, and each burns with the same 
fire, but with its own color. What could 
more illustrate how we are one beneath our 
differences than the sight of a single text 
or verse inspiring many different lives to be 
their best ? " 

From Letter of Introduction to " Helps by 
the Way," by Phillips Brooks, D.D. By per- 



Great books are not in everybody's reach ; 
and though it is better to know them thor- 
oughly than to know them only here and 
there, yet it is a good work to give a little to 
those who have neither time nor means to 
get more. 

S. T. Coleridge. 



The charm of the words of great men — 
those grand sayings which are recognized as 
true as soon as heard — is this, that you 
recognize them as wisdom which passed 
across your own mind. You feel that they 
are your own thoughts come back to you, 



PREFACE. V 

else you would not at once admit them : " All 
that floated across me before, only I could 
not say it, and did not feel confident enough 
to assert it, or had not conviction enough to 
put into words." 

F. W. Robertson. 



Every reader has his favorite author and 
favorite passages — texts to which he will 
turn in danger or sorrow with special expec- 
tation, and promises which will seem to have 
been written expressly for his personal use. 

Dr. Parker. 



I am but a gatherer and disposer of other 
men's stuff. Sir Henry Wotton. 



GEMS. 



Try to remember that " together " is the 
central word ; that what we need is to feel our 
nearness to God and God's nearness to us, 
and from this to be more and more sure of 
our nearness to each other. Do not live a 
solitary life. . . . The more you can in- 
terest yourself in the common life, the more 
close will you find that personal relationship 
with God on which everything depends. 

E. E. Hale. 



All is of God that is, and is to be ; 

And God is good. Let this suffice us still, 

Resting in childlike trust upon his will 

Who moves to his great ends unthwarted by 

the ill. 

Whittier. 

Bear ye one another's burdens, and so ful- 
fil the law of Christ. 



4 GEMS. 

What we truly and earnestly aspire to be, 
that in some measure we are. 

Mrs. Jameson. 

There may be times when you cannot 

find help, but there is no time when you 

cannot give help. 

George S. Merriam. 



In every " Oh, my Father ! " 
Slumbers deep a " Here, my child." 

Tholuck. 

If any man love the world, the love of the 
Father is not in him. 



Be just, and fear not. 

Let all the ends thou aimest at be thy coun- 
try's, 
Thy God's, and Truth's. 

Shakespeare. 

It does us good to admire what is good 
and beautiful ; but it does us infinitely more 
good to love it. We grow like what we ad- 
mire, but we become one with what we love. 

Mrs. Charles. 



GEMS. 5 

The great man must have that intellect 
which puts in motion the intellect of others. 
Walter Savage Landor. 



Train yourself to unselfishness in what the 
world calls little things. 



E. E. Hale. 



The crown of patience cannot be received 
where there has been no suffering. If thou 
refusest to suffer thou refusest to be crowned ; 
but if thou wishest to be crowned thou must 
fight manfully and suffer patiently. With- 
out labor none can obtain rest, and without 
contending there can be no conquest. 

Thomas X Kempis. 



Alas, how easily things go wrong ! 
A sigh too much, or a kiss too long, 
And there follows a mist and a weeping rain, 
And life is never the same again. 

George Macdonald. 



The man who cannot be trusted with his 

own business is not to be trusted with the 

king's. 

S a vile. 



6 GEMS. 

He who is false to present duty breaks a 
thread in the loom, and will find the flaw 
when he may have forgotten its cause. 

Beecher. 

Thou shalt need all the strength that God 

doth give 
Simply to live, my friend, simply to live. 

F. W. H. Myers. 



The grass withereth, the flower fadeth ; 
but the word of our God shall stand forever. 



Nor deem the irrevocable past 
As wholly wasted, wholly vain, 

If, rising on its wrecks, at last 
To something nobler we attain. 

Longfellow. 

When Death, the great reconciler, has 

come, it is never our tenderness we repent 

of, but our severity. 

George Eliot. 



Walk boldly and wisely in that light thou 

hast; 
There is a hand above will help thee on. 

Bailey. 



GEMS. 7 

I hear, yet say not much, but think the 

more. 

Shakespeare. 



Only in looking heavenward — take it in 
what sense you may — not in looking earth- 
ward, does what we call union, mutual love, 
and society begin to be possible. 

Carlyle. 

Dare to be true ; nothing can need a lie ; 

A fault, which needs it most, grows two 

thereby. 

George Herbert. 



It is good for me that I have been afflicted ; 
that I might learn thy statutes. 



My crown is called content; 

A crown it is that seldom kings enjoy. 

Shakespeare. 

All things work together for good to them 
that love God. 



In all women's deepest loves, be they ever 
so full of reverence, there enters sometimes 
much of the motherly element. 

Miss Mulock. 



5 GEMS. 

Why should we ever wear black for the 

guests of God ? 

John Ruskin. 

Greatly begin ! Though thou hast time 
But for a line, be that sublime ; 
Not failure, but low aim is crime. 

James Russell Lowell. 



Let your light so shine before men, that 
they may see your good works, and glorify 
your Father which is in Heaven. 



I find the great thing in this world is not 

so much where we stand, as in what direction 

we are moving. 

O. W. Holmes. 



What we have we prize not to the worth 

Whiles we enjoy it, but being lack'd and lost, 

Why, then we rack the value, then we find 

The virtue that possession would not show us 

Whiles we had it. 

Shakespeare. 

Except a man be born again he cannot 
see the kingdom of God. 



GEMS. 9 

There are a good many real miseries in 

life that we cannot help smiling at, but they 

are the smiles that make wrinkles and not 

dimples. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Be but yourselves, be pure, be true, 

And prompt in duty ; heed the deep 

Low voice of conscience. 

Whittier. 



None wield such absolute power over 
others as those who think little about them- 
selves. 

Miss Mulock. 



Whatsoever thing thou doest 
To the least of mine and lowest, 
That thou doest unto me. 

Longfellow. 

The dead are never dead to us, until we 
have forgotten them; they can be injured 
by us, they can be wounded, they know all 
our penitence, all our aching sense that their 
place is empty, all the kisses we bestow on 
the smallest relic of their presence. 

George Eliot. 



IO GEMS. 

To repel one's cross is to make it heavier. 

Amiel. 

Not capital, or labor, or land, or goods, 
but human relations, lie at the root of all 
social reforms. All questions between em- 
ployers and employed are to be solved in 
that way. Seek ye first the kingdom of God 
and his righteousness ; what is right, and 
just, and loving, and fair between man and 
man; the discovery of that is the only so- 
lution of all these stormy questions. 

F. D. Maurice. 

Who steals my purse, steals trash ; 
But he who filches from me my good name, 
Robs me of that which not enriches him, 
And makes me poor indeed. 

Shakespeare. 

Unto whomsoever much is given, of him 
shall be much required. 



Revelation is not sealed : 
Answering unto man's endeavor, 
Truth and right are still revealed. 



Samuel Longfellow. 



GEMS. 1 1 

You find yourself refreshed by the presence 
of cheerful people ; why not make an earnest 
effort to confer that pleasure on others ? You 
will find half the battle is gained if you never 
allow yourself to say anything gloomy. 

Lydia Maria Child. 



When God is pleased and wishes to bless 
the men he loves, his hands have other gifts 
than silver and gold. 



Ian Maclaren. 



They that wait upon the Lord shall renew 
their strength; they shall mount up with 
wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be 
weary ; and they shall walk, and not faint. 



Self-love leads men of narrow minds to 
measure all mankind by their own capacity. 

Jane Porter. 

Better a little chiding, than a great deal of 

heart-break. 

Shakespeare. 



Our trials grow with our years. 

Goethe. 



12 GEMS. 

What fates impose, that men must needs 

abide ; 
It boots not to resist both wind and tide. 

Shakespeare. 



An easy thing, O Power Divine, 

To thank thee for these gifts of thine ! 

For summer's sunshine, winter's snow, 

For hearts that kindle, thoughts that glow, 

But when shall I attain to this, — 

To thank thee — for the things I miss? 

T. W. HlGGINSON. 

He who would speak well must speak little. 
Christina of Sweden. 



Poor hints and sketches of souls as we are, 
we have need to help each other to gaze at 
the blessed heavens instead of peering into 
each other's eyes to find out the motes. 

George Eliot. 



Though to-day may not fulfil 
All thy hopes, have patience still ; 
For perchance to-morrow's sun 
Sees thy happier days begun. 

Gerhardt. 



GEMS. 13 

Till Death the weary spirit free, 

Thy God hath said, " 'Tis good for thee 

To walk by faith, and not by sight; M 

Take it on trust a little while. 

Soon thou shalt read the mystery right 

In the full sunshine of his smile. 

Keble. 

Be not overcome of evil, but overcome 
evil with good* 

God washes the eyes by tears until they 

can behold the invisible land where tears 

shall come no more. 

Beecher. 



Do thy duty ; that is best, 
Leave unto thy Lord the rest. 

Longfellow. 



People don't grow famous in a hurry, and 
it takes a deal of hard work even to earn 
your bread and butter. 

Miss Alcott. 

However things may seem, no evil thing 
succeeds, and no good thing is a failure. 

Longfellow. 



14 GEMS. 

Each time we love 
We turn a nearer and a broader mark 
To that keen archer, Sorrow, and he strikes. 

Alexander Smith. 



Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give 
thee a crown of life. 



There are those who never reason on what 
they should do, but on what they have done. 

Fielding. 



Believe me, nothing sets the world more 
straight than thinking that what is awry in it 
is one's self. 

OUIDA. 

The secret of oratory lies not in saying 
new things, but in saying things with a cer- 
tain power that moves the heavens. 

George Eliot. 



Give sorrow words ; the grief that doth not 

speak 

Whispers the o'erfraught heart and bids it 

break. 

Shakespeare. 



GEMS. 15 

Blessed are the pure in heart; for they 
shall see God. 



Grief is always conceited. It always thinks 
its case peculiar and unmatched. 



Beecher. 



The might of one fair face sublimes my love 
Till it hath purged my heart of low desires. 

Michael Angelo. 



Nothing ever happens but once in this 
world. What I do now I do once and for- 
ever. It is over — it is gone, with all its 
eternity of solemn meaning. 



Carlyle. 



A sacred burden is this life ye bear. 
Look on it, lift it, bear it solemnly, 
Stand up and walk beneath it steadfastly. 
Fail not for sorrow, falter not for sin, 
But onward, upward, till the goal ye win. 

Fanny Kemble. 



Lf new-got gold is said to burn the pockets 
till it be cast forth into circulation, much 
more may new truth. 



Carlyle. 



l6 GEMS. 

It is bitter to know those whom we love 

dead ; but it is more bitter to be as dead to 

those who, once having loved us, have sunk 

our memory beneath oblivion that is not the 

oblivion of the dead. 

Ouida. 



Whosoever doth not bear his cross, and 
come after me, cannot be my disciple. 



Do not wait for extraordinary opportun- 
ities for doing good actions, but make use 

of common situations. 

Goethe. 

" Enlarge not thy destiny," said the oracle ; 

" endeavor not to do more than is given thee 

in charge. " 

Emerson. 



We know very well that ideals can never 
be completely embodied in practice. And, 
yet, on the other hand, it is never to be for- 
gotten that ideals do exist, and that if they 
be not approximated to at all the whole man 

goes to wreck. 

Carlyle. 



GEMS. 17 

Casting all your care upon him, for he 
careth for you. 

Life is too short to waste 

In critic peep or cynic bark, 

Quarrel or reprimand : 

'Twill soon be dark ; 

Up ! mind thine own aim, and God speed 

the mark. 

Emerson. 



None can cure their harms by wailing 

them. 

Shakespeare. 

Walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye 
are called. 



What were the souls he sought ? 

What moved his inmost thought ? 

The friendless and the poor, 

The woes none else could cure, 

The grateful sinner's cry, 

The heathen's heavenward sigh, — 

Each in their lot and line 

Drew forth the love and life divine, 

Dean Stanley. 



18 GEMS. 

Heaven never helps the man who will not 

act. 

Sophocles. 

It makes the mind very free when we 

give up wishing, and only think of bearing 

what is laid upon us and doing what is given 

us to do. 

George Eliot. 

I found something within me that would 

not be sweet, and patient, and kind. I did 

what I could to keep it down, but it was 

there. I besought Jesus to do something for 

me, and when I gave him my will he came 

into my heart and took out all that would 

not be kind, all that would not be patient, 

and then he shut the door. 

George Fox. 



The heart — the heart that's truly blest 

Is never all its own ; 

No ray of glory lights the breast 

That beats for self alone. 

Eliza Cook. 

The world is the workshop of heaven. 

Beecher. 



GEMS. 19 

He that cometh to God must believe that 
he is, and that he is a rewarder of them 
that diligently seek him. 



God does not desire that we should pitch 
our tents in the valley of repentance and 
humiliation. He is satisfied if we only pass 
through on our way to the happy heights of 

peace beyond. 

Julia H. Thayer. 



There is no corporate conscience. Men 
who act in bodies, it matters not whether 
large or small, mobs, senates, or cabinets, 
will, without hesitation, take their share in 
measures which, if proposed to any of them 
as an individual, would make him reply with 
the Syrian, " Am I a dog that I should do 
this thing?" 

SOUTHEY. 



Where now with pain thou treadest, trod 

The whitest of the saints of God ; 

To show thee where their feet were set, 

The light which led them shineth yet. 

Whit tier. 



20 GEMS. 

To the noble mind 

Rich gifts wax poor, when givers prove un- 
kind. 

Shakespeare. 



Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on 
eternal life. 



He that is faithful in that which is least is 
faithful also in much. 



Better not be at all 

Than not be noble. 

Tennyson. 



Upon the churchyard of the whole earth 
should this universal epitaph be placed, — 
" Here lie the beings who in life knew not 
what they would have." 



RlCHTER. 



Were there a common bank made of all 

men's troubles, most would choose rather to 

take those they brought than venture on a 

new dividend, and think it best to sit down 

with their own. 

Socrates. 



GEMS. 2 1 

God only knows how blessed he would 
make us if we would but let him. 

Macdoxald. 



All the rivers run into the sea. 

O thou bounding, burning river, 

Hurrying heart : I seem 

To know (so one knows in a dream) 

That in the waiting heart of God forever, 

Thou too shalt find the sea. 

Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. 



Blessed is the man that endureth tempta- 
tion. 



'Tis not enough to help the feeble up, 
But to support him after. 

Shakespeare. 



Happiness is a state of constant occupation 
upon some desirable object, with a continual 
sense of progress towards its attainment. 

Madame de Stael. 



The things that are for thee, gravitate to 

thee. 

Emerson. 



22 GEMS. 

The empty vessel makes the greatest sound. 

Shakespeare. 



I have often observed that vulgar persons, 
and public audiences of inferior collective 
intelligence, have this in common : the least 
thing draws off their minds when you are 
speaking to them. 

O. W. Holmes. 

Give thy love freely: do not count the 

cost: 
So beautiful a thing was never lost 
In the long run. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



Better is a dry morsel and quietness there- 
with, than a house full of sacrifices with strife. 



The worst education which teaches self- 
denial is better than the best which teaches 
you everything else, and not that. 

J. Sterling. 

Be thou the true man thou dost seek. 

Whittier. 



GEMS. 23 

Enjoying things which are pleasant; that 

is not the evil : it is the reducing of our 

moral self to slavery by them, that is. Let a 

man assert withal that he is king over his 

habitudes, that he could and he would shake 

them off on cause shown, this is an excellent 

law. 

Carlyle. 

One shall grasp and one resign, 
One drink life's rue, and one its wine, 
And God shall make its balance good. 

Whittier. 



Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into 
temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but 
the flesh is weak. 



Men of character are the conscience of the 
society to which they belong. 

Emerson. 



Pain is no evil unless it conquer us. 

Charles Kingsley. 



He that is mighty hath done to me great 
things. 



24 GEMS. 

Man is the master of the world, and may 
make it what he will. Into his hands it is 
delivered, with all its mighty possibilities for 
good or evil, for happiness or misery. Fol- 
lowing the monitions and devices of the sub- 
human, he may make of it — what indeed, for 
some gentle and tender souls, it has already 
become — a very hell ; working with God 
and Nature, he may reconvert it into Para- 
dise. 

Anna Kingsford, M.D. 



If gratitude our speech benumb, 
And joy our laughter quell, 
May not eternity be dumb 
For things too good to tell ? 

Emerson. 



Girls we love for what they are; young 
men for what they promise to be. 

Goethe. 



Every good gift and every perfect gift is 
from above, and cometh down from the 
Father of lights, with whom there is no vari- 
ableness, neither shadow of turning. 



GEMS. 25 

In the moral world there is nothing impos- 
sible if we bring a thorough will to it. Man 
can do everything with himself, but he must 
not attempt to do too much with others. 

Von Humboldt. 



What are men better than sheep or goats 
That nourish a blind life within the brain, 
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer ? 

Tennyson. 



There is nothing in the universe that I fear, 

except that I may not know all my duty, or 

may fail to do it. 

Mary Lyon. 



Thank God there is always light whence to 

borrow, 

When darkness is darkest, and sorrow most 

sorrow. 

Alice Cary. 



The good things of life are not to be had 

singly, but come to us with a mixture, like a 

school boy's holiday, with a task affixed to 

the tail of it. 

Charles Lamb. 



26 GEMS. 

Heaven is above all yet : there sits a judge 
That no king can corrupt. 

Shakespeare. 

Him that overcometh, will I make a pillar 
in the temple of my God, and he shall go no 
more out. 



Many persons look upon others as they 
would look through the panes of their win- 
dows, not noticing either, until a blemish or 
a flaw appear. 



Alice A. Crawford. 



Since thou hast far to go, bear not along 
The clogging burden of a guilty soul. 

Shakespeare. 



There is another life, hard, rough and 
thorny, trodden with bleeding feet and ach- 
ing brow, the life of which the cross is the 
symbol, a battle which no peace follows this 
side the grave, which the grave gapes to 
finish before the victory is won, and — 
strange that it should be so — this is the 

highest life of man. 

J. A. Froude. 



GEMS. 27 

While I sought happiness she fled 

Before me constantly. 
Weary, I turned to duty's path, 

And happiness sought me, 
Saying : " I walk this road to-day; 

I'll bear thee company. " 

Henrietta M. Eliot. 



Music in its best sense does not require 
novelty; nay, the older it is, and the more 
we are accustomed to it, the greater are its 
effects upon the hearer of sensibility. 

Goethe. 



In human hearts what bolder thoughts can 

rise 

Than man's presumption on to-morrow's 

dawn. 

Where is to-morrow? 

Young. 



It is in human life as in a game at tables, 
where a man wishes for the highest cast ; 
but if his chance be otherwise, he is e'en to 
play it as well as he can, and to make the 

best of it. 

Plutarch. 



28 GEMS. 

He shall feed his flock like a shepherd ; he 
shall gather the lambs with his arm, and 
carry them in his bosom. 



I think it is a reasonable law that the one 
who takes wing should be the first to write, 
not the bird that stays in the old cage, and 
may be supposed to be eating the usual seed 
and groundsel, and looking at the same slice 
of the world through the same wires. 

George Eliot. 



Many are the afflictions of the righteous ; 
but the Lord delivereth him out of them all. 



Some reckon hours for months, and days 

for years ; 
And every little absence is an age. 

Dryden. 



" WeVe all got to go to school, I expect, 
and we don't all get the same lesson to learn, 
but the one we do get is our'n, 'tain't nobody 
else's, and if it's real hard, why, it shows the 
teacher thinks we're capable." 

Rose Terry Cooke. 



GEMS. 29 

Although we may be unable fully to realize 

our ideal, yet woe be to us if we have no 

ideal to realize. 

Whately. 

Blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, 

And, though a late, a sure reward succeeds. 

CONGREVE. 



Walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as 
wise, redeeming the time. 



Faith always implies disbelief of a lesser 

fact in favor of a greater. 

O. W. Holmes. 



No profit grows, where is no pleasure ta'en ; 
In brief, sir, study what you most affect. 

Shakespeare. 



Suffering is God's tool to cut life into 
beauty. 



Beecher. 



No woman with a heart in her bosom can 

mistake for long together when a man really 

loves her. 

i Miss Mulock. 



30 GEMS. 

Could we choose the time and choose aright, 
'Tis best to die, our honor at the height. 

Chaucer. 



As the heaven is high above the earth, so 
great is his mercy towards them that fear 
him. 



To revenge is no valor, but to bear. 

Shakespeare. 



Always there is a black spot in our sun- 
shine, and it is, even as I have said, the 

shadow of ourselves. 

Carlyle. 

What, in the midst of the mighty drama of 
life, are girls and their blind visions ? They 
are the yea or the nay of that good for which 
men are enduring and fighting. 

George Eliot. 

Be like a bird that, chancing to alight 

A while on boughs too slight, 

Feels them give way beneath her, and yet 

sings, 

Knowing that she hath wings. 

Victor Hugo. 



GEMS. 3 1 

The Lord God will help me ; therefore 
shall I not be confounded. 



Nothing is easier than to find fault, noth- 
ing so difficult as to do some real work. 

George Eliot. 



Heaven's gate is shut to him that comes 

alone ; 
Save thou a soul, and it shall save thine own. 

Whittier. 



There never was a person who did any- 
thing worth doing that did not receive more 
than he gave. 



Beecher. 



A man is, in general, better pleased when 

he has a good dinner upon his table than 

when his wife speaks Greek. 

Johnson. 

" It's poor eating when the flavor of the 

meat lies in the cruets. There's folks as 

make bad butter and trusten' to the salt to 

hide it." 

George Eliot. 



32 GEMS. 

Though I walk in the midst of trouble, 
thou wilt revive me. 



Time that is lost thou never canst recall; 

Of time to come thou art not sure at all ; 

The present only is within thy power, 

And, therefore, now improve the present 

hour. 

Byron. 

Each year, one vicious habit rooted out, in 
time ought to make the worst man good. 

Franklin. 



The oyster sickens while the pearl doth sub- 
stance win. 

Thank God for pains that prove a noble 
growth within. 



Trench. 



There is in souls a sympathy with sounds. 
And as the mind is pitched, the ear is 

pleased 
With melting air or martial, brisk or grave; 
Some chord in unison with what we hear 
Is touched within us, and the heart replies. 

Cowper. 



GEMS. 33 

The sense of fear is necessary to all real 
courage. . . . Not to be destitute of 
fear, but to be able to control it ; to be self- 
possessed in the midst of danger — this alone 

makes the real hero. 

James Freeman Clarke. 



Let us hold fast the profession of our 
faith without wavering; for he is faithful 
that promised. 



The ignorant imagine the learned, whom 
they have never seen, to be always talking in 
dark sentence and fine language; the sim- 
plicity and humility of real knowledge — of 
a Sir Isaac Newton — passes their under- 
standing. 

Catherine Stanley. 



The strength of affection is a proof not of 
the worthiness of the object, but of the large- 
ness of the soul which loves. 

F. W. Robertson. 



How blindly we talk when we talk of 

trifles ! 

Miss Mulock. 



34 GEMS. 



Before they call I will answer ; and while 
they are yet speaking, I will hear. 



You will never find time for anything : if 
you want time you must make it. 

Charles Buxton. 



The future seemed barred 
By the corpse of a dead hope. 

Owen Meredith. 



There is only one kind of hatred the fruit 
of which is peace — the hatred of self. 

Hare. 



To all that sow, the time of harvest shall 
be given. 



WHITTIER. 



If there be any good in thee, believe that 
there is much more in others, that so thou 
mayest preserve humility. 

Thomas a Kempis. 



Recollection is the only Paradise from 
which we cannot be turned out. 

RlCHTER. 



GEMS. 35 

Why do we suffer? Why should God, 

Who loves his creatures, scourge them so? 

He hath a right — we need the rod ; 
That is enough for us to know. 

Margaret J. Preston. 



I am the good shepherd, and know my 
sheep, and am known of mine. 



Ah ! Love was never yet without 
The pang, the agony, the doubt. 

Byron. 



If man is not made for God, why is he 
only happy in God? If he is made for God, 
why does he so greatly withstand God ? 

Pascal. 



Many, indeed, think of being happy with 
God in heaven ; but the being happy with 
God on earth never enters into their thought. 

John Wesley. 

He who reforms himself has done more 

towards reforming the public than a crowd 

of noisy, impotent patriots. 

Lavater. 



36 GEMS. 

Is there a heart that music cannot melt? 

Beattie. 



A little learning is a dangerous thing: 
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring; 
These shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, 
And drinking largely sobers us again. 

Pope. 



He that loveth me not, keepeth not my 
sayings. 

Never did a man yet want weapons, who 
had a good arm and a stout heart. 

Rabelais. 

There is no substitute for thorough-going, 

ardent, and sincere earnestness. 

Dickens. 



We shape ourselves the joy or fear 
Of which the coming life is made, 
And fill our Future's atmosphere 
With sunshine or with shade. 

Whittier. 



Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it 
with thy might. 



GEMS. 37 

One must be somebody in order to have 

enemies. 

Madame Swetchine. 



The Lord redeemeth the soul of his ser- 
vants, and none of them that trust in Him 
shall be desolate. 



To thee be all men heroes ; every race noble ; 

all women virgins; and each place a 

temple. 
Know thou nothing that is base. 

Owen Meredith. 

There are many echoes in the world, and 

but few voices. 

Goethe. 

Happy were men, if they but understood 
There is no safety but in doing good. 

Fountain. 



We love flattery, even when we see through 

it and are not deceived by it, for it shows 

that we are of importance enough to be 

courted. 

Emerson. 



38 GEMS. 

He serves his country best 

Who lives pure life, and doeth righteous deed, 

And walks straight paths, however others 

stray ; 
And leaves his sons, as uttermost bequest, 
A stainless record which all men may read. 

Susan Coolidge. 

Affection is the broadest basis of a good 

life. 

George Eliot. 



One fire burns out another's burning, 
One pain is lessened by another's anguish. 

Shakespeare. 



For one man who can stand prosperity, there 
are a hundred that will stand adversity. 

Carlyle. 



Sorrow seems sent for our instruction, as 
we darken the cages of birds when we would 
teach them to sing. 

RlCHTER. 



When music grieves, 
The past returns in tears. 

Alexander Smith. 



GEMS. ■ 39 

Give me that man 

That is not passion's slave, and I will wear 

him in my heart's core. 

Shakespeare. 



Who holds to his another's heart 
Must needs be worse or better. 

Whittier. 



The rest of Christ is not that of torpor, 

but harmony; it is not refusing the struggle, 

but conquering in it ; not resting from duty, 

but finding rest in duty. 

F. W. Robertson. 



We hand folks over to God's mercy and 

show none ourselves. 

George Eliot. 



Great souls are always loyally submissive, 

reverent to what is above them ; only mean 

souls are otherwise. 

Carlyle. 



It is better to fence the precipice at the 
top than to wait with an ambulance at the 
bottom. 

Ellice Hopkins. 



40 GEMS. 

Heaven and earth shall pass away; but 
my words shall not pass away. 



Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he 
shall sustain thee. 



The cradle empty, blesses more than the 

cradle full. 

Beecher. 

If life an empty bubble be. 

How sad for those who cannot see 

The rainbow in the bubble ! 

Frederick Locker. 



When I meet a man who has the courage 
to rise at an early hour every morning, I 
straightway conceive a high idea of the firm- 
ness of his character. 

Archbishop of Rheims. 



We speak of educating our children; do 
we know that our children also educate us ? 

Mrs. Sigourney. 



Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh 
to you. 



GEMS. 41 

One self-approving hour whole years out- 
weighs 
Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas. 

Pope. 



He satisfieth the longing soul. 



You need not tell all the truth, unless to 
those who have a right to know all. But let 
all you tell be the truth. 



Horace Mann. 



All who joy would win, 
Must share it, — happiness was born a twin. 

Byron. 



Next to the virtue, the fun in the world is 
what we least can spare. 

Agnes Strickland. 



Self-love is not so vile a sin 
As self-neglecting. 



Shakespeare, 



Friendship has a power 
To soothe affliction in her darkest hour. 

H. K. White. 



42 GEMS. 

There are so many sad things in life that 
we have to take upon trust, and bear, and 
be patient with, and never understand. 

Miss Mulock. 



Sleep after toyle, port after stormy seas, 
Ease after warre, death after life, 
Does greatly please. 

Spenser. 



If God be for us, who can be against us ? 



It does not matter how many, but how 
good, books you have. It is much better to 
trust yourself to a few good authors than to 
wander through several. 

Seneca. 

Forever from the hand that takes 
One blessing from us, others fall; 

And soon or late our Father makes 
His perfect recompense to all. 

Whittier. 



The most difficult thing in life is to know 
yourself. 



Thales. 



GEMS. 43 

You will find life full of sweet savor, if 

you do not expect from it what it cannot 

give. 

Renan. 



Good manners are made up of petty sacri- 
fices. 

Emerson. 

She was the smallest lady alive ; 

Made in a piece of nature's madness ; 

Too small almost for the life and gladness 

That overfilled her. 

Browning. 



A man without decision can never be said 

to belong to himself. 

Foster. 



Life is made up, not of great sacrifices, or 
duties, but of little things, in which smiles and 
kindnesses, and small obligations given habit- 
ually are what win and preserve the heart and 

secure comfort. 

Sir Humphrey Davy. 



Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord 
and he shall lift you up. 



44 GEMS. 

The heart has its own memory, like the mind, 

And in it are enshrined 

The precious keepsakes, into which are 

wrought 

The giver's loving thought. 

Longfellow. 



Be loving, and you will never want for love 
— be humble, and you will never want for 
guiding. 



Miss Mulock. 



Of your philosophy you make no use 
If you give place to accidental evils. 

Shakespeare. 



Each man can learn something from his 

neighbor; at least he can learn this — to 

have patience with his neighbor, to live and 

let live. 

Charles Kingsley. 



Music, which gentlier on the spirit lies 
Than tired eyelids upon tired eyes. 

Tennyson. 

If it rains, let it rain ; we shall not drown. 

Alice Cary. 



GEMS. 45 

Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God. 



Life every man holds dear; but the brave 

man 
Holds honor far more precious — dearer than 

life, 

Shakespeare. 



Oh, how bitter a thing it is to look 
Into happiness through another man's eyes ! 

Shakespeare. 

Anger wishes that all mankind had only 
one neck ; love, that it had only one heart ; 
grief, two tear-glands; and pride, two bent 
knees, 

RlCHTER. 

My heart and mind and self never in tune ; 
Sad for the most part ; then in such a flow 
Of spirits I seem now hero — now buffoon. 

Leigh Hunt. 



You may try, but can never imagine, what 
it is to have a man's force of genius in you, 
and yet suffer the slavery of being a girl. 

George Eliot. 



46 GEMS. 

The kingdom of God is within you. 



I want not only to be loved, but to be told 

that I am loved, — the realm of silence is 

large enough beyond the grave. 

George Eliot. 



What a blessed thing it is that Nature, 
when she invented, manufactured, and pat- 
ented her authors, continued to make critics 
out of the chips that were left ! 

O. W. Holmes. 



Men care little enough for sense in their 
sweethearts; but there is nothing they so 
unfailingly demand of their wives. 

Octave Thanet. 



Nought's had, all's spent, 

Where our desire is got without content. 

Shakespeare. 



When I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be 
a light unto me. 

Let him that thinketh he standeth take 
heed lest he fall. 



GEMS. 47 

Every one of us must conquer himself, 
and we may do so if we take our conscience 
as our guide and general. 

Sir John Lubbock. 



Affliction, when I know it, is but this : 

A deep alloy, whereby man toughened is to 

bear the hammer. 

John Fletcher. 



He who gave thee being did not frame 
The mystery of life to be the sport 
Of merciless men. 

SOUTHEY. 

She had ceased to think that her own lot 

could be happy, had ceased to think of 

happiness at all; the one end of her life 

seemed to be the diminishing of sorrow to 

others. 

George Eliot. 



A right measure and manner in getting, 
saving, spending, giving, taking, lending, 
borrowing, and bequeathing would almost 
argue a perfect man. 



Sir Henry Taylor. 



48 GEMS. 

More Edens are destroyed by mosquitoes 

than by serpents. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



The kindest and the happiest pair 
Will find occasion to forbear; 
And something, every day they live, 
To pity, and perhaps forgive. 

Cowper. 

There is no knowledge for which so great 

a price is paid as a knowledge of the world ; 

and no one became an adept in it except at 

the expense of a hardened and wounded 

heart. 

Countess of Blessington. 



Ah ! if you knew what peace there is in an 
accepted sorrow ! 



Madame Guyon. 



What avails it that indulgent Heaven 

From mortal eyes has wrapt the woes to 

come, 
If we, ingenious to torment ourselves, 
Grow pale at hideous fictions of our own. 

Armstrong. 



GEMS. 49 

Joys are our wings, sorrows are our spurs. 

RlCHTER. 



All things are possible to him that believ- 
eth. 

All may have, 
If they dare choose, a glorious life or grave. 

George Herbert. 



Success and glory are the children of hard 
work and God's favor. 

ESCHYLUS. 



Judge no one by his relations, whatever 

criticisms you pass upon his companions. 

Relations, like features, are thrust upon us ; 

companions, like clothes, are more or less of 

our own selection. 

Kate Field. 



I am glad to think 
I am not bound to make the world go right, 
But only to discover and to do with cheer- 
ful heart 
The work that God appoints. 

Jean Ingelow. 



50 GEMS. 

No man having put his hand to the 
plough, and looking back, is fit for the 
kingdom of God. 



If we are the best we can be towards 
others, they are, in turn, the best they can 
be towards us. 

AUERBACH. 



A house built on sand is, in fair weather, 

just as good as if builded on a rock. A 

cobweb is as good as the mightiest chain 

cable when there is no strain on it. It is 

trial that proves one thing weak and another 

strong. 

Beecher. 



Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law, 
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw ; 
Some livelier plaything gives his youth 

delight, 
A little louder, but as empty quite. 

Pope. 



A man's life consisteth not in the abun- 
dance of the things which he possesseth. 



GEMS. 5 1 

True happiness, if understood, 
Consists alone in doing good. 

SOMERVILLE. 



If you apply to a man's reason, you only 

apply to half of him, and that the smallest 

half. 

Daniel O'Connell. 



My memory serves too often as an unkind 

friend, 
And I remember things I would forget, 
While I forget the things I would remember. 

Longfellow. 



It is so easy to do good, and so hard to be 
good ! 



F. R. Havergal. 



If we had a keen vision and feeling of all 

ordinary human life it would be like hearing 

the grass grow and the squirrel's heart beat, 

and we should die of that roar which lies on 

the other side of silence. As it is, the 

quickest of us walk about well-wadded with 

stupidity. 

George Eliot. 



52 GEMS. 

Society is no comfort to one not sociable. 

Shakespeare. 

Thou hast a charmed cup, old Fame, 
A draught that mantles high, 
And seems to lift this mortal frame 
Above mortality. 

Away ! to me — a woman — bring 
Sweet waters from Affection's spring. 

Mrs. Hemans. 



Blessed are they that mourn; for they 
shall be comforted. 



When you wish to know what to do, ask 

yourself what Christ would have done in the 

same circumstances. 

Horace Mann. 



We are all of us nothing in ourselves; 
only here and there we pluck a bit of laven- 
der ; that is, we do some kind thing, or say 
some kind word, and then we get a sweet 

savor from it. 

Ouida. 

Be slow to blame. 

Mary Howitt. 



GEMS. 53 

The greatest homage we can pay to truth 

is to use it. 

Emerson. 

If our hearts condemn us, God is greater 
than our hearts and knoweth all things. 



He who hath no inward beauty none per- 
ceives, 
Though all around is beautiful. 



Dana. 



A grave, wherever found, preaches a short 
pithy sermon to the soul. 



Hawthorne. 



It is a joy to think the best we can of 

human kind. 

Wordsworth. 



Some men are so eager to make noise in 
the world that, if they had their choice, 
they would rather beat a drum than touch a 
lyre. 



Duncan Macgregor. 



Be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven 
thee. 



54 GEMS. 

God's goodness hath been great to thee : 
Let never day, nor night unhallowed pass, 
But still remember what the Lord hath done. 

Shakespeare. 



The scintillations of calumny and detrac- 
tion, if you do not blow them, will extinguish 
themselves. 

BOERHAAVE. 

How empty learning, and how vain is art, 
But as it mends the life and guides the heart. 

Young. 



Great things almost always have to grow 
with struggles. 



Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



Read the best books first, or you may not 
have a chance to read them at all. 

Thoreau. 



A self-suspicion of hypocrisy is a good 
evidence of sincerity. 



Hannah More. 



Weeping may endure for a night, but joy 
cometh in the morning. 



GEMS. 55 

I love these little people; and it is not 

a slight thing when they, who are so fresh 

from God, love us. 

Dickens. 



Our greatest good and what we can least spare 
Is hope. 



Armstrong. 



There is only one person you need to 
manage and that is yourself. 

Talmage. 



Worthy books 
Are not companions, — they are solitudes : 
We lose ourselves in them, and all our cares. 

Bailey. 



Every man, however humble his station or 

public his powers, exercises some influence 

on those who are about him, for good or 

evil. 

Swift. 

Make yourself an honest man, and then 

you may be sure that there is one less rascal 

in the world. 

Carlyle. 



56 GEMS. 

There is a great deal of unmapped country 

within us, which would have to be taken 

into account in explanation of our gusts 

and storms. 

George Eliot. 



There is no folly equal to that of throwing 

away friendship in a world where friendship 

is so rare. 

Bulwer-Lytton. 



If all the year were playing holidays, 
To sport would be as tedious as to work. 

Shakespeare. 

Every man is in some sort a failure to him- 
self. No one ever reaches the heights to 

which he aspires. 

Longfellow. 



This world is very lovely ; 

O my God, 
I thank thee that I live ! 

Alexander Smith. 



Mine honor is my life ; both grow in one ; 
Take honor from me, and my life is done. 

Shakespeare. 



GEMS. 57 

We ask for long life, but 'tis deep life or 
grand moments that signify. Let the meas- 
ure of time be spiritual, not mechanical. 

Emerson. 



If thou art rich, thou art poor ; 
For like an ass, whose back with ingots 

bows, 
Thou bearest thy heavy riches but a journey, 
And death unloads thee. 

Shakespeare. 



No insult offered to a man can ever degrade 
him; the only real degradation is when he 
degrades himself. 



Miss Mulock. 



What is there in this world that is half so 
valuable to us as to love one another, and to 
live in the hope of loving one another for- 
ever? 

Carlyle. 

There is nothing insignificant, nothing ! 

Coleridge. 



Better is a little with righteousness than 
great revenues without right. 



58 GEMS. 

The heavens are just, and time suppress- 
ed wrongs. 

Shakespeare, 



Tell me not in mournful numbers 
Life is but an empty dream. 

Longfellow. 



The true happiness of man consists in 
being united to God, and his only misery is 
being separated from him. 



Plato. 



Every man's work, pursued steadily, tends 
to become an end in itself, and so to bridge 
over the loveless chasms in his life. 

George Eliot. 



Like a morning dream, life becomes more 
and more bright the longer we live, and the 
reason of everything appears more clear. 
What has puzzled us before seems less mys- 
terious, and the crooked paths look straighter 
as we approach the end. 

RlCHTER. 



If any man be a worshipper of God, and 
doeth his will, him he heareth. 



GEMS. 59 

There is no peace, saith my God, to the 
wicked. 



Knowledge is gold to him who can discern 
That he who loves to know must love to 

learn. 

John Boyle O'Reilly. 



Whoever exalteth himself shall be abased ; 
and he that humbleth himself shall be 
exalted. 

Pin thy faith to no man's sleeve. Hast 
thou not two eyes of thine own? 

Carlyle. 



The eternal step of progress beats 

To that great anthem, calm and slow, 

Which God repeats. 

Whittier. 



Life, like war, is a series of mistakes, and 
he is not the best Christian nor the best 
general who makes the fewest false steps. 
He is the best who wins the most splendid 
victories by the retrieval of mistakes. 

F. W. ROBERTSOX. 



60 GEMS. 

Love me, and tell me so sometimes ! 

Gail Hamilton. 



The fairest action of our human life 
Is scorning to avenge an injury; 
For who forgives without a further strife, 
His adversary's heart to him doth tie. 
And 'tis a firmer conquest, truly said, 
To win the heart than overthrow the head. 
Lady Elizabeth Carew. 



Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear 
much fruit ; so shall ye be my disciples. 



Foolish men mistake transitory semblances 

for eternal fact, and go astray more and 

more. 

Carlyle. 

To all that sow, the time of harvest shall 

be given. 

Whittier. 



He is a man of sense w r ho does not grieve 

for what he has not, but rejoices in what he 

has. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 6 1 

God likes an earnest soul — 

Too earnest to be eager ; soon or late 

It leaves the spent horde breathless by the 

way, 
And stands serene, triumphant at the goal. 
Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



In my distress I cried unto the Lord and 
he heard me. 

Every unpleasant feeling is a sign that I 
have become untrue to my resolutions. 

RlCHTER. 



Celerity is never more admired 
Than by the negligent. 

Shakespeare. 



This earth, I say, is an earnest place. 
Life is no grimace, but a most serious fact. 

Carlyle. 



So long as you are innocent, fear nothing. 

Longfellow. 



I have no greater joy than to hear that my 
children walk in truth. 



62 GEMS. 

Coldness of heart comes more often from 

ignorance than from want of kindness, or of 

will to sympathize. 

Miss Thackeray. 



Man, proud man ! 
Drest in a little brief authority- 
Plays such fantastic tricks be- 
fore high heaven, 
As make the angels weep. 

Shakespeare. 



The whole value of a dime depends upon 
knowing what to do with it. 



Emerson. 



No life 

Can be pure in its purpose and strong in its 

strife 

And all life not be purer and stronger 

thereby. 

Owen Meredith. 



Reform, like charity, begins at home. 

Carlyle. 



Though the Lord be high, yet hath he 
respect unto the lowly. 



GEMS. 63 

What we call trouble is only the key that 
draws our heart-strings truer, and brings 
them up sweet and even to the pitch. Don't 
mind the strain, believe in the note every 
time his finger touches and sounds it. 

Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



Our life's floor 
Is laid upon Eternity ; no crack in it 
But shows the underlying Heaven. 

Charles Kingsley. 



It is one sign of the tendency of human 

nature to goodness, that it grows good under 

a thousand bad influences. 

Channing. 



The miserable have no other medicine 
But only hope. 



Shakespeare. 



'Tis better that our griefs should not 
spread far. 



George Eliot. 



Blessed is the man that trusteth in the 
Lord, and whose hope the Lord is. 



64 GEMS. 

When a strong brain is weighed with a true 

heart, it seems to me like balancing a bubble 

against a wedge of gold. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Why should I hug life's ills with cold reserve 

To curse myself and all who love me? 

Nay! 

A thousand times more good than I deserve 

God gives me every day. 

Celia Thaxter. 



The opportunity and ability to repent is 
one of the highest privileges that God has 
granted to man. 



Elizabeth Peabody. 



Work thou for pleasure; paint or sing or 

carve 
The thing thou lovest, though the body 

starve. 
Who works for glory misses oft the goal ; 
Who works for money coins his very soul. 

Kenyon Cox. 



Endure hardness as a good soldier of 
Jesus Christ. 



GEMS. 65 

It is not virtue, but only luxury, to take 
away the crown of thorns from a lacerated 
brow, the prickly girdle from sore nerves. 

RlCHTER. 



Tis the joy of my life that his love is so 

great, 
Such a life in my life; that my Lord does 

not wait, 

But over the mountains and over the sea, 

With the steps of a victor, comes grandly to 

me. 

Margaret Sangster. 



Hearts don't break if they know where to 
go for strength. 



Miss Alcott. 



The end of man is an action, and not a 
thought, though it were the noblest. 

Carlyle. 



Touch us gently, Time, 
Let us glide adown thy stream ; 
Gently, as we sometimes glide 
Through a quiet dream. 

Barry Cornwall. 



66 GEMS. 

The domestic man, who loves no music 

so well as his own kitchen-clock, the airs 

which the logs sing to him as they burn on 

the hearth, has solaces which others never 

dream of. 

Emerson. 

Ignorance is the curse of God : 

Knowledge, the wing wherewith we fly to 

heaven. 

Shakespeare. 



It's good to put bother away over night. 
It all straightens out in the morning. 

Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



That life is long which answers life's great 

end. 
The time that bears no fruit deserves no 

name. 
The man of wisdom is the man of years. 

Young. 



The nearer you come into contact with a 
person, the more necessary do tact and 
courtesy become. 



O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 67 

Most people have some other person, real 
or imaginary, who is more " comfortable " to 
them than any one else — to whom in trouble 
the thoughts always fly first; who, in sick- 
ness, would be chosen to smooth the weary 
pillow, and holding whose hand they would 

like to die. 

Miss Mulock. 



O God, my sins are manifold : against my life 

they cry, 
And all my guilty deeds foregone up to thy 

temple fly. 
Wilt thou release my trembling soul, that to 

despair is driven? 

" Forgive ! " a blessed voice replied, " and 

thou shalt be forgiven. " 

Bishop Heber. 



Who art thou that judgest another? 



God sees us as we are altogether, not in 
separate feelings and actions, as our fellow- 
men see us. 

George Eliot. 



Tribulation worketh patience. 



68 GEMS. 

My library was dukedom large enough. 

Shakespeare. 



No one is so insignificant as to be sure his 
example can do no hurt. 

Lord Clarendon. 



The path of sorrow, and that path alone, 
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown. 

Cowper. 



We all have our secret sins; and if we 

knew ourselves, we should not judge each 

other harshly. 

George Eliot. 



Men's faults do seldom to themselves ap- 
pear. 

Shakespeare. 



When we are willing to be comforted, 
divine comfort is not far away. 

Dr. John Broadus. 



Give of thy love, a suffering world hath need ; 

Christ gave to thee that thou his lambs might 

feed. 

E. H. Chase. 



GEMS. 69 

I am the Lord, I change not. 



Love is not altogether a delirium, yet it 
has many points in common therewith. I 
call it rather a discerning of the infinite in 
the finite, of the ideal made real. 

Carlyle. 



The gods in bounty work up storms about us, 

That give mankind occasion to exert 

Their hidden strength, and throw out into 

practice 
Virtues that shun the day, and lie concealed 
In the smooth seasons and the calms of life. 

Addison. 

In God have I put my trust : I will not be 
afraid what man can do unto me. 



No man has a right to say unto his Maker, 
" My burden is heavier than I can bear." 

Miss Mulock. 



He who would be a great soul in the 
future must be a great soul now. 

Emerson. 



yo GEMS. 

The mind shall banquet, though the body- 
pine. 

Shakespeare. 



Life has many anguishes ; but perhaps 
the sharpest of all is an anguish of which 
nobody knows. 



Miss Mulock. 



The bravest are the tenderest, 
The loving are the daring. 

Bayard Taylor. 



He giveth power to the faint, and to them 
that have no might he increaseth strength. 



A talent can be perfected in solitude; 
character, only in the world. 



Goethe. 



Let your lives be as pure as a snowfield, 

where your footsteps leave a mark, but no 

stain. 

Madame Swetchine. 



The worth of the State in the long run is 
the worth of the individuals composing it. 

John Stuart Mill. 



GEMS. 71 

In nature there's no blemish but the mind ; 
None can be called deformed but the un- 
kind. 

Shakespeare. 

O Lord, that lends me life, 
Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness ! 

Shakespeare. 



The law of Nature is, Do the thing, and 
you shall have the power ; but they who do 
not do the thing have not the power. 

Emerson. 

When you wish to affirm anything you 

always call God to witness, because he never 

contradicts you. 

Madame de Sevigne. 



I will listen to any one's convictions, but 
pray keep your doubts to yourself: I have 
plenty of my own. 



Goethe. 



If there be a crime 
Of deeper dye than all the guilty train 
Of human vices, 'tis ingratitude. 

Brooke. 



72 GEMS. 

Men ought always to pray, and not to 
faint. 



Most of the ills we poor mortals know 
From doctors and imagination flow ! 

Churchill. 



All the ends of the earth shall see the 
salvation of our God. 



Love, that is but an episode in the life of 

man, is the entire story of the life of a 

woman. 

Madame de Stael, 



They only miss 
The winning of that final bliss 
Who will not count it true that Love, 
Blessing, not cursing, reigns above, 
And that in it we live and move. 

Trench. 



Thinking has often made me very un- 
happy, acting never has. Do something — 
do good if you can, but do something. 

Miss Gaskell. 



GEMS. 73 

Kind words are the music of the world. 

Faber. 

In the government of men a great deal 
may be done by severity, more by love, but 
most of all by clear discernment and impartial 
justice which pays respect to no person. 

Goethe. 

Seldom can a heart be lonely 
If it seeks a lonelier still ; 
Self-forgetting, seeking only 
Emptier cups of love to fill. 

F. R. Havergal. 



The eternal God is thy refuge, and under- 
neath are the everlasting arms. 



Life is short, and we have never too much 
time for gladdening the hearts of those who 
are travelling the same dark journey with us. 
Oh, be swift to love, make haste to be kind ! 

Amiel. 



Business is labor, and man's weakness such ; 
Pleasure is labor — and tires as much. 

Cowper. 



74 GEMS. 

Help whoever, whenever you can ; 
Man forever needs aid from man. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



The Lord will be a refuge for the op- 
pressed, a refuge in times of trouble. 



It never hath been hurtful to any to hold 
his peace; to speak, damage to many. 

F. Lyly. 



If a man can, when provisions is riz so, 
Eat his own words, 'tis a marcy it is so. 
James Russell Lowell. 



Leisure for men of business and business 
for men of leisure would cure many com- 
plaints. 



Mrs. Thrales. 



If we hope for what we are not likely 
to possess, we act and think in vain, and 
make life a greater dream and shadow than 
it really is. 



Addison. 



I, even I, am he that comforteth you. 



GEMS. 75 

We, meantime, our ills 
Heap up against this good, and lift a cry 
Against this work-day world, this ill- spread 

feast, 
As if ourselves were better certainly 
Than what we come to. Maker and High 

Priest, 
I ask thee not my joys to multiply, 
Only to make me worthier of the least. 

Mrs. Browning. 



I am not good enough yet to deserve 
happiness. I think too much of human love, 
too little of divine. When I have made God 
my friend, perhaps he will let me find and 
keep one heart to make life happy with. 

Miss Alcott. 



Perform a good deed, speak a kindly word, 

bestow a pleasant smile, and you will receive 

the same in return. 

Patrick Henry. 



The heart that trusts, forever sings, 
And feels as light as it had wings. 

Isaac Williams. 



76 GEMS. 

Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose 
mind is stayed on thee. 



Habit is a cable ; we weave a thread of it 
every day, and at last we cannot break it. 

Horace Mann. 



Let Fate do her worst, there are relics of joy, 
Bright dreams of the past, which she cannot 

destroy ; 
Which come in the night-time of sorrow and 

care, 

And bring back the features that joy used to 

wear. 

Moore. 

Sorrows humanize the race. Tears are the 
showers that fertilize the world. 

Jean Ingelow. 

He that cannot withal keep his mind to 

himself, cannot practise any considerable 

thing whatever. 

Carlyle. 



No man can be wise on an empty stomach. 

George Eliot. 



GEMS. 77 

How much there is self-will to do, 
Were it not for the dire dismay 
That bids ye shrink, as ye suddenly think 
Of " What will my neighbors say? " 

Mary Howitt. 



In your patience possess ye your souls. 



It is a great thing to have a sense of 
humor. To go through life with no sense 
of the humorous and ridiculous is like rid- 
ing in a wagon without springs. 



Beecher. 



The worst is not 
So long as we can say, This is the worst. 

Shakespeare. 



Life alone can impart life, and though we 

should burst we can only be valued as we 

make ourselves valuable. 

Emerson. 



This floating life hath but this port of rest, 
A heart prepared, that fears no ill to come. 

Samuel Daniel. 



78 GEMS. 

Man is born not to solve the problem of 
the universe, but to find out where the 
problem begins, and then to restrain himself 
within the limits of the comprehensible. 

Goethe. 



Every human heart is human. 

Even in savage bosoms 

There are longings, yearnings, strivings 

For the good they comprehend not. 

Longfellow. 



This is life eternal, that they might know 
thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ 
whom thou hast sent. 



The good are better made by ill, 
As odors crushed are sweeter still. 

Rogers. 



The highest breeding comes round to the 
Indian standard, to take everything coolly. 

O. W. Holmes. 



i 

j 



Be firm ! one constant element in luck 
Is genuine, solid, old Teutonic pluck. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 79 

It is a common error, of which a wise man 
will beware, to measure the worth of our 
neighbor by his conduct towards ourselves. 

RlCHTER. 



The Father himself loveth you. 



We each have all the time there is - — our 
mental and moral status is determined by 
what we do with it, 

Mary Blake. 



Not in the clamour of the crowded street, 
Not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng, 
But in ourselves are triumph and defeat. 

Longfellow. 



A man is great who confers the most 

benefits; he is base — and that is the one 

base thing in the universe — to receive favors 

and render none. 

Emerson. 



Some men carry their intellect in a dark 

lantern and will only see what they choose 

to cast the light on. 

Mrs. Jameson. 



80 GEMS. 

One likes to talk of one's self so much that 

one never tires of a tete a ttte with a lover 

for years. That is why a devotee likes to be 

with her confessor. It is for the pleasure of 

talking of one's self— even though speaking 

evil. 

Madame de Sevigne. 



When the world goes hard and wrong, 
Lend a hand to help him along; 
When his stockings have holes to darn, 
Don't you grudge him your ball of yarn. 

O. W. Holmes. 

We count them happy which endure. 



If I am faithful to the duties of the present, 
God will provide for the future. 



Bedell. 



What is nobler than to live for others? 

Miss Alcott. 



There is no darkness but ignorance. 

Shakespeare. 



The love of Christ constraineth us. 



GEMS. 8 1 

It is not enough to speak, but to speak true. 

Shakespeare. 



To do wrong is to inflict the surest injury 
on our own peace. No enemy can do us 
equal harm with what we do ourselves, when- 
ever and however we violate any moral or 

religious obligation. 

Channing. 



Be near me when all else is from me drifting: 

Earth, sky, home's pictures, days of shade 

and shine, 

And kindly faces to my own uplifting 

The love which answers mine. 

Whittier. 



There is dew in one flower and not in an- 
other, because one opens itself and takes in, 
while the other closes itself and the drop 
runs off. So God rains goodness and mercy 
as wide as the dew, and if we lack them, it is 
because we will not open our hearts to re- 
ceive them. 

Channing. 

Her eyes are homes of silent prayer. 

Tennyson. 



82 GEMS. 

Blessed is he that considereth the poor; 
for the Lord will deliver him in time of 
trouble. 



Don't flatter yourself that friendship au- 
thorizes you to say disagreeable things to 

your intimates. 

O. W. Holmes. 



One in our faith, and one our longing 
To make the world within our reach 

Somewhat the better for our living, 
And gladder for our human speech. 

Whittier. 



The best thing to give your enemy is for- 
giveness; to an opponent, tolerance; to a 
friend, your heart; to your child, a good 
example ; to a father, deference ; to your 
mother, conduct that will make her proud of 
you ; to yourself, respect; to all men, charity. 

Mrs. Balfour. 



We bury love ; 
Forgetfulness grows over it like grass : 
That is a thing to weep for, not the dead. 

Alexander Smith. 



GEMS. 83 

Let us be silent, that we may hear the 

whispers of the gods ! 

Emerson. 



Keep thy heart with all diligence ; for out 
of it are the issues of life. 



We ought to slip over many thoughts 
that pass through our minds, and pretend 

not to see them. 

Madame de Sevigne\ 



Heaven knows what would become of our 

sociability if we never visited people we speak 

ill of; we should live like Egyptian hermits 

in crowded solitude. 

George Eliot. 



Still panting o'er a crowd to reign, 
More joy it gives to woman's breast 

To make ten frigid coxcombs vain 
Than one true, manly lover blest. 

Pope. 



In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he 
shall direct thy paths. 



84 GEMS. 



" What is your duty? " The carrying out 
of the affairs of the day that lies before you. 

Goethe. 

Make the best of everything; 
Think the best of everybody ; 
Hope the best for yourself; 
Do as I have done — persevere. 

George Stephenson. 



People seem not to see that their opinion 
of the world is also a confession of character. 
We can only see what we are, and if we mis- 
behave we suspect others. 



Emerson. 



Love took up the glass of Time and turned it 

in his glowing hands ; 
Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself in 

golden sands. 



Tennyson. 



Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I 
command you. 

He jests at scars that never felt a wound. 

Shakespeare. 



or,-\lS. 85 

Be thankful if your own soul has been 
spared perplexity, and judge not those to 
whom a harder lot has been given. 

George Eliot. 



By silence, I hear other men's imperfec- 
tions and conceal my own. 

Zeno. 



" 'Fliction is kind of curus ; it don t hurt 
nothing at the first go-off, to what it does, 
come to set down and chaw on't." 

Rose Terry Cooke. 



I sometimes hold it half a sin 
To put in words the grief I feel ; 
For words, like Nature, half reveal 
And half conceal the soul within. 

Tennysox. 



Who is a God like unto thee, that par- 
doneth iniquity? 

Half the sting of poverty is gone when one 
keeps house for one's own comfort, and not 
for the comments of one's neighbors. 

Miss Mulock. 



86 GEMS. 

I could hardly feel much confidence in a 
man who had never been imposed upon. 

Hare. 



Rumor is a pipe 

Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures ; 

The still-discordant wavering multitude 

Can play upon it. 

Shakespeare. 



Silence is vocal if we listen well. 

J. G. Holland. 

Fame usually comes to those who are 
thinking about something else — very rarely 
to those who say to themselves, " Go to, 
now, let us be a celebrated individual ! " 

O. W. Holmes. 



Make my mortal dreams come true 
With the work I fain would do ; 
Clothe with life the weak intent, 
Let me be the thing I meant ! 

Whittier. 



Whoso hearkeneth unto me shall dwell 
safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil. 



GEMS. 87 

To take up our life as it is, and do the best 
we can to make it great and good, — our 
best to make it fit to give back one day to 
the Lord who gave it, — that is to live. 

Mrs. Leith Adams. 



Men are April when they woo, December 
when they wed. 



Shakespeare. 



Hope in our souls is king. 

Longfellow. 



A good book, whether a novel or not, is 
one that leaves you farther on than when 
you took it up. If, when you drop it, it 
drops you down in the same old spot, with 
no finer outlook, no cleared vision, no stimu- 
lated desires for that which is better and 
higher, it is in no sense a good book. 

Anna Warner. 



The healing of his seamless dress 

Is by our beds of pain; 

We touch him in life's throng and press, 

And we are whole again. 



WHITTIER. 



88 GEMS. 

There is no beautifier of complexion or 
form or behavior like the wish to scatter 
joy and not pain around us. 

Emerson. 



Enough and too much of the sect and the 

name, 
What matters our label, so truth be our aim? 
The creed may be wrong, but the life may be 

true, 

And hearts beat the same under drab coats 

or blue. 

Whittier. 

I have given ye an example, that ye should 
do as I have done to you. 



Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the 
end of the world. 



The glory is not in the task, but in the 

doing it for him. 

Jean Ingelow. 

The devil tempts us not — 'tis we tempt him, 
Beckoning his skill with opportunity. 

George Eliot. 



GEMS. 89 

Put not your trust in money, but put your 

money in trust. 

O. W. Holmes. 



" Marryin' a man ain't like settin' alongside 

of him nights and hearm' him talk pretty ; 

that's the fust prayer. There's lots and lots 

of meetin' after that." 

Rose Terry Cooke. 



The smile that is worth the praises of earth 
Is the smile that shines through tears. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



Speak evil of no man. 



By great sorrows the human heart is pro- 
tected against small ones — by the waterfall 
against the rain. 

RlCHTER. 

God's ways seem dark, but, soon or late, 
They touch the shining hills of day ; 
The evil cannot brook delay, 
The good can well afford to wait. 

Whittier. 



go GEMS. 

Whoso is heroic will always find crises to 

try his edge. 

Emerson. 



The Christian is he whose life-work glows 
and grows under his hand, who is conscious 
of an unceasing call for strenuous activity, 
who takes for his watchword the great apos- 
tle's question, " Lord, what wilt thou have 

me to do ? " 

Rev. A. P. Peabody. 



Even the Son of man came not to be 
ministered unto, but to minister. 



A call or command from God can never 
be countermanded by any human voice. 
Mrs. Ballington Booth. 



Run if you like, but try to keep your breath ; 
Work like a man, but don't be worked to 

death ; 
And with new notions, — let me change the 

rule, — 
Don't strike the iron till it's slightly cool. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 91 

The brightest rainbows ever play 
Above the fountains of our tears. 

Mackay. 



It is impossible that anything so natural, 
so necessary, and so universal as death 
should ever have been designed by Provi- 
dence as an evil to mankind. 

Dean Swift. 



Sad soul, take comfort, nor forget 
That sunrise never failed us yet. 

Celia Thaxter. 



He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve 
the children of men. 



There is no charity in a man's leaving 
money in his will. He has got to leave it. 

Mr. Gladstone. 



If thou dost love me, to my own be loving, 
By service done unto my weak ones proving 
The love thou bearest him who strengthens 
thee. 
Lovest thou me ? 

L. H. Coburn. 



/ 



92 GEMS. 

We need not die to go to God. 



Whittier. 



Do your best loyally and cheerfully, and 

suffer yourself to feel no anxiety or fear. 

Your times are in God's hands. He has 

assigned you your place ; he will direct your 

paths ; he will accept your efforts if they be 

faithful ; he will bless your aims if they be 

for your soul's good. 

Canon Farrar. 



I hold it truth with one who sings 
To one clear harp in divers tones, 
That men may rise on stepping-stones 
Of their dead selves to higher things. 

Tennyson. 



Pray without ceasing. In everything give 
thanks ; for this is the will of God in Christ 
Jesus concerning you. 



Better the chance of shipwreck on a 

voyage of high purpose than to expend life 

in paddling hither and thither on a shallow 

stream to no purpose at all. 

Miss Sedgwick. 



GEMS. 93 

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not 
all his benefits. 



No one really fails who does his best. 

Sir Johx Lubbock. 



To hold fast upon God with one hand and 
open wide the other to your neighbor — that 
is religion. 



Macdonald. 



What if the days are dreary ? 

What if ear:h wears no smile ? 

A gate will open outward 

In such a little while. 

E. L. Beers. 



Never yet were the feelings and instincts 

of our nature violated with impunity; never 

yet was the voice of conscience silenced 

without retribution. 

Mrs. Jameson. 

God gives us love, something to love 

He lends us. 

Tennyson. 



He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool. 



94 GEMS. 

Life is a flower of which love is the honey. 

Victor Hugo. 



Lord, what music hast thou prepared for 
good men in heaven, when thou affordest 
such music to bad men upon earth? 

Izaak Walton. 

Be not afraid to act yourself, 

But have your motive good ; 

He can afford, whose heart is right, 

To be misunderstood. 

Swift. 

A stupid person is made glorious by a 

noble deed. 

George Eliot. 



Ignorance is a blank sheet on which we 
may write; but error is a scribbled one 
from which we must erase. 

COLTON. 



Rage is the shortest passion of our souls ; 
Like narrow brooks that rise with sudden 

showers, 
It swells in haste, and falls as soon again. 

Rowe. 



GEMS. 95 

Immodest words admit of no defence, 
For want of decency is want of sense. 

Pope. 



His heart was as great as the world, but 
there was no room in it to hold the memory 
of a wrong. 



Emerson. 



Tis greatly wise to talk with our past hours, 

And ask them what report they bore to 

heaven. 

Young. 

The little worries that we meet each day 
May lie as stumbling-blocks across our way, 
Or we may make them stepping-stones to be 
Of grace, O Lord, to thee ! 

A. E. Hamilton. 



Sorrow there is, but in every cup is min- 
gled a drop of balm. 



Fanny Fern. 



Come what may, 
Time and the hour run through the roughest 
day. 



Shakespeare. 



96 GEMS. 

It is the Lord: let him do what seemeth 
him good. 

It is good to be attracted out of ourselves. 
Charlotte BrontI 



" Tears to me trouble is a kind of mellerin , 
process, and ef you take it kindly it does you 
good, and you learn to be glad of it." 

Miss Alcott. 



The fear of the Lord is the beginning of 
wisdom. 



No cord or cable can draw so fondly or 

bind so fast as love can do with only a single 

thread. 

Burton. 

We know what we are, but know not what 

we may be. 

Shakespeare. 



Apology is only egotism wrong side out. 

Nine times out of ten, the first thing a man's 

companion knows of his shortcomings is from 

his apology. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 97 

Could we see when and where we are to 
meet again, we would be more tender when 
we bid our friends good-by. 

OUIDA. 



Think naught a trifle, though it small appears ; 

Small sands the mountain, moments make 

the year, 

And trifles life. 

Young. 

Hereby we do know that we love him, if 
we keep his commandments. 



I will not leave you comfortless ; I will 
come to you. 

Time is cried upon as a great thief: it is 

people's own fault. Use him but well, and 

you will get from his hand more than he will 

ever take from you. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



The one who will be found on trial capable 
of great acts of love is ever the one who is 
always doing considerate small ones. 

F. W. Robertson. 



98 GEMS. 

He who is on good terms with poverty is 

rich. 

Seneca. 

As to people saying a few idle words 

about us, we must not mind that, any more 

than the old church-steeple minds the rooks 

cawing about it. 

George Eliot. 



They who forgive most shall be most for- 
given. 

Bailey. 



Actions in the view of most men change 
their color when seen in the aggregate mass 
and in the individual instance, as the deep 
blue of the ocean is colorless in the drop. 

Dr. Nichols. 



" It doos seem hard sometimes to think 
we can't fix other folks's ways just as we 
would have 'em be. But I think likely we 
should make some amazin' blunders if 
we could and did. The Lord made 'em and 
he certainly knows best how to manage 'em, 
and it's good to think he doos." 

Rose Terry Cooke. 



GEMS. 99 

I know not what I could have been, but feel 

I am not what I should be. 

Byron. 



I would we were all of one mind and one 
mind good. 



Shakespeare. 



They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. 



Learn how to listen, and you will profit 
even from those who talk badly. 

Plutarch. 



To-morrow's fate, though thou be wise, 
Thou canst not tell nor yet surmise ; 
Pass, therefore, not to-day in vain, 
For it will never come again. 

Omar Khayyam. 



There are no such words as " too late " in 
the wide world, nay, not in the universe. 
What ! shall we, whose atom of time is but a 
fragment out of an ever-present eternity, 
— shall we, as long as we live, or even at 
our life's ending, dare to cry out " too late " ? 

Miss Mulock. 



100 GEMS. 



If the crowns of all the kingdoms of the 
empire were laid at my feet in exchange for 
my books and my love of reading, I would 
spurn them all. 



Fenelon. 



Create in me a clean heart, O God, and 
renew a right spirit within me. 



God be thanked that the dead have left still 
Good undone for the living to do, — 
Still some aim for the heart and the will 
And the soul of a man to pursue. 

Owen Meredith. 



The Lord knows how to make stepping- 
stones for us of our defects, even ; it is what 
he lets them be for. He remembereth — 
he remembered in the making — that we 
are but dust; the dust of earth, that he 
chose to make something little lower than the 

angels out of. 

Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in 
thy sight. 



GEMS. IOI 

The truly illustrious are they who do not 
court the praise of the world, but perform 
the actions which deserve it. 

TlLTON. 



To excel others is a proof of talent; but 
to know when to conceal that superiority is 
a greater proof of prudence. 



Colton. 



Evil, once manfully fronted, ceases to be 

evil, there is generous battle hope in place 

of dead, passive misery; the evil itself has 

become a kind of good. 

Carlyle. 



God hides himself within the love 

Of those whom we love best ; 
The smiles and tones that make our homes 

Are shrines by him possessed. 

W. C. Gannett. 



Man looketh on the outward appearance, 
but the Lord looketh on the heart. 



Whatever ought to be done can be done. 

Mrs. Stowe. 



102 GEMS. 

To man and wife, independence is equal — 
confidence is reciprocal — dependence is 
mutual. 

LUCRETIA MOTT. 



Give battle to the leagued world : if thou'rt 

worthy, truly brave, 
Thou shalt make the hardest circumstance a 

helper or a slave. 



Alexander Smith. 



It is a woman and only a woman — a 
woman all by herself if she likes, and with- 
out any man to help her — who can turn a 

house into a home. 

Frances Power Cobbe. 



There's no art 
To find the mind's construction in the face. 

Shakespeare. 



As thy days, so shall thy strength be. 



Of all the women whom I have known, I 
chiefly remember those who forget them- 
selves. 

Beaconsfield. 



GEMS. IO3 

Through sins and flaws and stains 

I feel thy presence shine. 
Take me, and make divine 

All that uncleansed remains ! 

Lucy Larcom. 



In the education of children love is first to 

be installed, and out of love obedience is to 

be educated. 

Coleridge. 



The last, best fruit which comes to perfec- 
tion, even in the kindliest soil, is tenderness 
towards the hard ; forbearance towards the 
unforbearing ; heart-warmth towards the cold ; 
philanthropy towards the misanthropic. 

RlCHTER. 



Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, 
thou shalt not escape calumny. 

Shakespeare. 



He that endureth to the end shall be 
saved. 



Notice other people's faults only to avoid 

them. 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 



104 GEMS. 

Oh, leave these jargons, and go your way 
straight to God's work in simplicity and 

singleness of heart ! 

Florence Nightingale. 



The birds must know. Who wisely sings 

Will sing as they ; 
The common air has generous wings ; 

Songs make their way. 

Helen Hunt Jackson. 



The Lord preserveth all them that love 
him. 



" Don't keep turnin' your troubles over, 
git a-top of 'em somehow, and stay there if 
you can." 



Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



How far that little candle throws his beams ! 
So shines a good deed in a naughty world. 

Shakespeare. 



Humility is the first of virtues — for other 
people. 



O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 105 

The more we do, the more we can do. 

Hazlitt. 

In conversation be sincere ; 
Keep conscience as the noon-tide clear ; 
Think how all-seeing God thy ways 
And all thy secret thoughts surveys. 

Thomas Ken. 



" It's mighty slipperifyin' work bein' a 
Christian. Yer goes along nice en smoov 
fur awhile, en yer say, ' Hi ! dis is fine ! ' en 
de debbil grease yer up so slick dat yer 
hain't ketch hold uv yerself, en fust t'ing yer 
know dar yer is, hangin' by a bramble-bush 
over de bottomless pit, smellin' de sulphur 
av yer own wickedness ! En dar ain't noth- 
ing fur to do but trus' de Lord en look up, 
en he'll pull yer out vvid his strong arm en 

set yer top end fo'most." 

Frances C. Baylor. 



Where words are scarce, they are seldom 

spent in vain ; 
For they breathe truth that breathe their 

words in pain. 



Shakespeare. 



106 GEMS. 

The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life. 



Adversity is the only balance to weigh 

friends. 

Plutarch. 



Few men suspect how much mere talk 
fritters away spiritual energy — that which 
should be spent in action spends itself in 
words. Hence he who restrains that love of 
talk lays up a fund of spiritual strength. 

F. W. Robertson. 



When obstacles and trials seem 

Like prison walls to be, 

I do the little I can do, 

And leave the rest to thee. 

Faber. 



What doth the Lord thy God require of 
thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk 
in all his ways, and to love him, and to 
serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart 
and with all thy soul ? 



Even Christ pleased not himself. 



GEMS. 107 

It is not by change of circumstances, but 
by fitting our spirits to the circumstances in 
which God has placed us, that we can be 
reconciled to life and duty. 

F. W. Robertson. 



Those friends thou hast, and their adoption 

tried, 
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel. 

Shakespeare. 



To the Christian who really believes in the 

agency of God in the smallest events of his 

life, confides in his love, and makes his 

sympathy his refuge, the thousand minute 

cares and perplexities of life become each 

one a fine affiliating bond between the soul 

and its God. 

Harriet Beecher Stowe, 



Search thine own heart. What paineth thee 
In others, in thyself may be. 



Whittier. 



Judge not, and ye shall not be judged ; 
condemn not, and ye shall not be con- 
demned ; forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. 



108 GEMS. 

Nothing is more simple than greatness ; 
indeed, to be simple is to be great. 

Emerson. 



Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour. 

Shakespeare. 



He is already dead who lives only to keep 

himself alive. 

Goethe. 



We don't know each other's burdens, the 
weight or the beauty of them ; and we don't 
often know what is inside our own. We 
shall find out when we get to the top. 

Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



Tis time this heart should be unmoved, 

Since others it has ceased to move, 

Yet, though I cannot be beloved, 

Still let me love. 

Byron. 



There is alway hope in a man that actually 

and earnestly works. In idleness alone is 

there perpetual despair. 

Carlyle. 



GEMS. I09 

Who gives and hides the giving hand, 
Nor counts on favor, fame, or praise, 
Shall find his smallest gift outweighs 
The burden of the sea and land. 

Whittier. 

If one had a dozen lives or so, it would all 
be very well, but to have but a single ticket 
in the great lottery, and have that drawn a 
blank, is a rather sad sort of thing. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Intelligence and courtesy not always are com- 
bined ; 
Often in a wooden house a golden room we 

find. 

Longfellow. 



There is nothing covered that shall not be 
revealed; neither hid that shall not be 
known. 



A man should never be ashamed to own 
that he has been in the wrong, which is but 
saying in other words that he is wiser to-day 
than he was yesterday. 



Pope. 



IIO GEMS. 



Try and keep clear of wanting small sums 
that you haven't got. 



George Eliot. 



I can't make out but jest one gin'r'l rule — 
No man need go an' make himself a fool, 
Nor judgment ain't like mutton, that can't 

bear 
Cooking too long, nor be took up too rare. 
James Russell Lowell. 



Clever men are good, but they are not the 

best. 

Emerson. 



Love requires not so much proofs as ex- 
pressions of love. Love demands little else 
than the power to feel and to requite love. 

RlCHTER. 



Strive with the wanderer from the better 

path, 

Bearing thy message meekly, not in wrath ; 

Weep for the frail that err, the weak that fall, 

Have thine own faith, but hope and pray for 

all. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 1 1 1 

There hath no temptation taken you but 
such as is common to man ; but God is faith- 
ful, who will not suffer you to be tempted 
above that ye are able ; but will with the 
temptation also make a way to escape, that 
ye may be able to bear it. 



I had better never see a book than be 

warped by its attraction clean out of my own 

orbit, and be made a satellite instead of a 

system. 

Emerson. 



A religious life is a struggle, and not a 

hymn. 

Madame de Stael. 



The hopes that lost in some far distance seem 
May be the truer life, and this the dream. 

Adelaide Procter. 



The days are ever divine. They come and 

go like muffled and veiled figures sent from a 

distant friendly party, but they say nothing, 

and if we do not use the gifts they bring, they 

carry them as silently away. 

Emerson. 



112 GEMS. 

Behold, what manner of love the Father 
hath bestowed upon us, that we should be 
called the sons of God. 



Gird your hearts with silent fortitude, 
Suffering, yet hoping all things. 

Mrs. Hemans. 



The secret of life is not to do what one 
likes, but to try to like that which one has to 
do, and one does come to like it — in time. 

Miss Mulock. 



There is a comfort in the strength of love; 

' Twill make a thing endurable, 

Which else would o'erset the brain, 

Or break the heart. 

Wordsworth. 



Humble yourselves, therefore, under the 
mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you 
in due time. 



Man, if you are anything, walk alone, and 

talk to others. Do not hide yourself in the 

chorus. 

Epictetus. 



GEMS. 113 

Of every noble work, the silent part is best ; 
Of all expression, that which cannot be ex- 
pressed. 

W. W. Story. 



If we cannot inherit a good name, at least 
we can do our best to leave one. 

Thackeray. 



Reason may be the lever, but sentiment 
gives you the fulcrum and the place to stand 
on if you want to move the world. Even 
" sentimentality," which is sentiment over- 
done, is better than the affectation of supe- 
riority to human weaknesses. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Thou earnest not to thy place by accident, 
It is the very place God meant for thee ; 
And should'st thou there small scope for 
action see, 
Do not for this give room to discontent. 

Trench. 



Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for 
him. 



114 GEMS. 

I think that pitying angels must sometimes 
weep over the useless torments, the unneces- 
sary anguish, which foolish mortals inflict 

upon themselves. 

Miss Braddon. 



Not so, not so ! No load of woe 
Need bring despairing frown ; 

For while we bear it, we can bear ; 
Past that, we lay it down. 

Sarah Williams. 

Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify, 

but nine times out of ten the best thing that 

can happen to a young man is to be tossed 

overboard, and compelled to sink or swim 

for himself. In all my acquaintance I never 

knew a man to be drowned who was worth 

the saving. 

J. A. Garfield. 

My newest griefs to thee are old ; 
My last transgression of thy law, 
Though wrapped in thought's most secret 

fold, 
Thine eyes with pitying sadness saw. 

H. M. Kimball- 



GEMS. 115 

One finger's breadth at hand will mar 

A world of light in heaven afar, 

A mote eclipse a glorious star, 

An eyelid hide the sky. 

Keble. 



Blessed is the man who maketh the Lord 
his trust. 



To take up the cross of Christ is no great 
action done once for all ; it consists in the 
continual practice of small duties which are 

distasteful to us. 

J. H. Newman. 

Come good or ill, 
Whate'er to-day, to-morrow brings, 
It is his will. 

Isaac Williams. 



Cowardice asks, " Is it safe? " Expediency 
asks, " Is it politic ? " Vanity asks, " Is it 
popular ?" but Conscience asks, "Is it 
right?" 



PUNSHON. 



God is known just as much as he is loved. 

Bernard. 



Il6 GEMS. 

Be noble, and the nobleness that lies 
In other men, sleeping, but never dead, 
Will rise in majesty to meet thine own. 

Lowell. 



Whatsoever is brought upon thee, take it 
cheerfully. 

It is only when we turn our backs upon 

the universe and draw on our own resources 

that we succeed. 

Emerson. 



It is not our beliefs that frighten us half so 

much as our fancies. 

O. W. Holmes. 



What man in his right senses, that has 
wherewithal to live free, would make himself 
a slave for superfluities? What does that 
man want who has enough? Or what is he 
the better for abundance that can never be 
satisfied ? 

L'ESTRANGE. 



When the people complained it displeased 
the Lord. 



GEMS. 1 1 7 

111 that he blesses is our good, 

And unblest good is ill; 

And all is right that seems most wrong, \ 

If it be his sweet will. 

Faber. 



I am not worthy of the least of all the 
mercies and of all the truth which thou hast 
showed unto thy servant. 



There is a great song forever sung and 
we're all parts and notes of it, if we will just 
let him put us in tune. 

Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney. 



No one could endure and overcome solitude 
if it were not for the hope of companionship 
in the future, or for the belief in invisible 
companionship in the present. 



RlCHTER. 



When thou hast thanked thy God 

For every blessing sent, 

What time will then remain 

For murmurs or lament ! 

Trench. 



r 



Il8 GEMS. 

When a plunge is to be made into the 
water, it's no use lingering on the bank. 

Dickens. 



After all, the joy of success does not equal 
that which attends the patient working. 

Augusta Evans. 



Some of your griefs you have cured, 

And the sharpest you still have survived, 

But what torments of pain you've endured j 
From evils that never arrived ! 



Emerson. 



Thoughts come into our minds by avenues 
which we never left open, and thoughts go 
out of our minds through avenues which we 
never voluntarily opened. 

Emerson. 



Love, if you knew the light 
That your soul casts in my sight ! 

How I look to you 

For the pure and true, 
And the beauteous and the right ! 

Robert Browning. 



GEMS. 119 

To appreciate the noble is a gain which 
can never be torn from us. 

Goethe. 



If the sense of the ridiculous is one side of 
an irrepressible nature, it is very well; but 
if that is all there is in a man he had better 
have been an ape and stood at the head of 
his profession at once. 

O. W. Holmes. 



When a man truly loves a woman, he 
would not marry her upon any account unless 
he was quite certain he was the best person 
she could possibly marry. 

Miss Mulock. 



I have my trials. Time has laid his hand 
Upon my heart, gently, not smiting it, 
But as a harper lays his open palm 
Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations. 

Longfellow. 



Any coward can fight a battle when he's 
sure of winning, but give me the man who 
has pluck to fight when he's sure of losing. 

George Eliot. 



120 GEMS. 

We, ignorant of ourselves, 

Beg often our own harms, which the wise 

powers 

Deny us for our good ; so find we profit 

By losing of our prayers. 

Shakespeare. 



God's plans, like lilies pure and white, unfold. 
We must not tear the close-shut leaves apart : 
Time will reveal the calyxes of gold. 

May Riley Smith. 



If you've got a man's heart and soul in 
you, you can't be easy a-making your own 
bed and leaving the rest to lie on the stones. 

George Eliot. 

Cease to lament for that thou canst not help, 
And study helps for that which thou 

lament'st; 
Time is the nurse and breeder of all good. 

Shakespeare. 

I should like to see any kind of a man, 

distinguishable from a gorilla, that some good 

and even pretty woman could not shape a 

husband out of. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 121 

Not the hearers of the law are just before 
God, but the doers of the law shall be jus- 
tified. 

God sent his singers upon earth 
With songs of sadness and of mirth, 
That they might touch the hearts of men, 
And bring them back to heaven again. 

Longfellow. 

A man that studieth revenge keepeth his 

own wounds green, which otherwise would 

heal and do well. 

Bacon. 

We fuss and we fret 

About the one we didn't get; 

But we needn't make such an awful fuss 

If the one we didn't want didn't get us. 

Phozbe Gary. 



The foolish and the dead alone never 

change their opinions. 

Lowell. 



Order is the sanity of the mind, the health 
of the body, the peace of the city, the security 
of the State. 

SOUTHEY. 



122 GEMS. 

Some things, after all, come to the poor 
that can't get in at the doors of the rich, 
whose money somehow blocks up the en- 
trance-way. 

Geo. Macdonald. 



We are not all alone unhappy: 

This wide and universal theatre 

Presents more woeful pageants than the scene 

Wherein we play. 



Shakespeare. 



Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for 
thereby some have entertained angels una- 
wares. 



" The moral question's alius plain enough, 
It's jes' the human natur side thet's tough ; 
Wut's best to think mayn't puzzle me nor you, 
The pinch comes in decidin* wut to do." 

Lowell. 



A heart unloving among kindred has no 
love towards God's saints. If we have a cold 
heart toward a servant or a friend, why should 
we wonder if we have no fervor toward God? 

Cardinal Manning. 



GEMS. 123 

Woe unto them that call evil good, and 
good evil ! 

Not how much talent have I, but how much 
will to use the talent that I have, is the main 
question. Not how much do I know, but 
how much do I do with what I know. 

W. C. Gannett. 



Life's but a means unto an end, that end 
Beginning, mean, and end to all things — God ! 

Bailey. 

Temptations are enemies outside the castle 

seeking entrance. If there be no false retainer 

within, who holds treacherous parley, there 

can scarcely be an offer. 

Beecher. 



What's done we partly may compute, 
But know not what's resisted. 

Robert Burns. 

Show me the man you honor. I know- 
by that symptom, better than any other, what 
you are yourself. For you show me then 
what your ideal of manhood is, what kind of 
a man you long inexpressibly to be. 

Carlyle. 



124 GEMS. 

Love alone is not sufficient in marriage. 

But wanting love nothing else suffices — no 

outward suitability, no tie of gratitude or 

duty. All break like threads before the 

wrench of the never-ending wheel of daily 

cares. 

Miss Mulock. 

It's faith in something and enthusiasm for 
something that makes a life worth looking at. 

O. W. Holmes. 



The man who seeks but one thing in life, and 

but one, 
May hope to achieve it before life be done ; 
But he who seeks all things wherever he goes, 
Only reaps from the hopes which around him 
he sows, 

A harvest of barren regrets. 

Owen Meredith. 



Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel. 



The Past and the Future are veiled ; but 
the Past wears the widow's veil, the Future 
the virgin's. 



RlCHTER. 



GEMS. 125 

Who ne'er have loved, and loved in vain, 

Can neither feel nor pity pain. 

Byron. 



Hold fast to the present. Every position, 
every moment of life, is of unspeakable value 
as the representatives of a whole eternity. 

Goethe. 



A man should make sacrifices to keep clear 

of doing a wrong: sacrifices won't undo it 

when it's done. 

George Eliot. 

Making believe to be what you are not is 

the essence of vulgarity. 

O. W. Holmes. 



To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 

Wordsworth. 

Those who discharge promptly and faith- 
fully all their duties to those who " still live" 
in the flesh can have but little time for pok- 
ing and peering into the life beyond the 
grave. Better attend to each world in its 

proper order. 

Horace Greeley. 



126 GEMS. 

O Nature ! Sweet to every stricken one, 
Thy voices, infinite in harmony, 
Chant secret things of Peace. 

A. S. Hardy. 



Whoever would do good in this world 
ought not to deal in censure. We ought not 
to destroy, but rather to construct. 



Goethe. 



The secret things belong to the Lord our 
God. 

How can a man, without clear vision in his 

heart first of all, have any clear vision in the 

head? It is impossible. 

Carlyle. 



What a comfort a dull but kindly person 

is, to be sure, at times ! A ground-glass 

shade over a gas-lamp does not bring more 

solace to our dazzled eyes than such a one 

to our minds. 

O. W. Holmes. 



It is not a lucky word — this same impos- 
sible ; no good comes of those that have it 

so often in their mouths. 

Carlyle. 



GEMS. 127 

They are poor 
That have lost nothing ; they are poorer far 
Who, losing, have forgotten ; they most poor 
Of all who lose and wish they might forget. 

Jean Ingelow. 

In time of trial, let a man set his heart 
firmly upon this resolution : I must bear it 
inevitably, and I will, by God's grace, do it 
nobly. 

RlCHTER. 



The epochs of our life are not in the visi- 
ble facts, but in the silent thoughts by the 
wayside as we walk. 



Emerson. 



It is very good to be left alone with the 
truth sometimes, to hear, with all its stern- 
ness, what it will have to say to us. 

Carlyle. 

The dial receives many shades, and each 

points to the sun. 
The shadows are many, the sunlight is one. 

Owen Meredith. 



How long halt ye between two opinions? 
If the Lord be God, follow him. 



128 GEMS. 

We can hardly learn humility and tender- 
ness enough except by suffering. 

George Eliot. 



It makes a great difference in the force of 
a sentence whether a man be behind it or 

no. 

Emerson. 

Sin has many tools, but a lie is a handle 

that fits them all. 

O. W. Holmes. 

Love is as needful 
To being as breath ; 
Loving is dreaming 
And waking is death. 

John Boyle O'Reilly. 



Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither 
have entered into the heart of man, the 
things which God hath prepared for them 
that love him. 

The best education in the world is that got 
by struggling to get a living. What is defeat? 
Nothing but the first step to something better. 

Wendell Phillips. 



GEMS. 129 

Being all fashioned of the self-same dust, 
Let us be merciful as well as just. 

Longfellow. 

Lean not on one mind constantly, 
Lest where one stood before, two fall. 
Something God hath to say to thee 
Worth hearing from the lips of all. 

Owen Meredith. 

The hope of the righteous shall be glad- 
ness ; but the expectation of the wicked shall 
perish. 

Study how to do the most good, and let 
the pay take care of itself. 

Lyman Abbott. 



On adamant our wrong we all engrave, 
But write our benefits upon the wave. 

Dr. William King. 



Each human heart must bear alone its 
cross. 

Julia C. R. Dorr. 

All may have, 
If they dare choose, a glorious life or grave. 

George Herbert. 



I30 GEMS. 

A man behind the times is apt to speak ill 

of them, on the principle that nothing looks 

well from behind, 

O. W. Holmes. 



Man shall not live by bread alone. 



A man in this world is a boy spelling in 

short syllables ; but he will combine them in 

the next. 

Beecher. 

Maidens, like moths, are caught by glare, 

And Mammon wins his way where seraphs 

would despair. 

Byron. 



For the noblest man who lives, there still 

remains a conflict. 

Garfield. 

'Tis a rule of manners to avoid exaggeration. 

Emerson. 



The earth is great; but the heart which 
rests upon it is still greater than the earth, 
and greater than the sun, ... for it 
alone thinks the greatest thought. 

Richter. 



GEMS. 1 3 I 

My Father ! Thou hast knowledge — only 

thou — 
How dreary 'tis for women to sit still 
On winter nights, by solitary fires, 
And hear the nations praising them far off, 
Too far ! 

Mrs. Browning. 

Withhold not good from them to whom it 
is due, when it is in the power of thine hand 
to do it. 

Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day, 
Live till to-morrow, will have passed away. 

COWPER. 

The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that 
of a cannon, but its echo lasts a deal longer. 

O. W. Holmes. 



More hearts pine away in secret anguish for 
the want of kindness from those who should be 
their comforters than from any other reason. 

Dr. Young. 

A set of mortals has risen who believe that 
truth is not a printed speculation, but a prac- 
tical fact. 

Carlyle. 



132 GEMS. 

We do not what we ought ; 
What we ought not, we do, 
And lean upon the thought 
That chance will bring us through. 

Matthew Arnold. 



Everywhere in life the question is, not 
what we gain, but what we do. 

Carlyle. 

I know not what I could have been, but feel 
I am not what I should be. 

Byron. 

The multitude of the wise is the welfare of 
the world. 



The nearer you come into relation with a 
person, the more necessary do tact and cour- 
tesy become. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Self-love is not so vile a sin 
As self-neglecting. 



Shakespeare. 



What makes old age so sad is, not that 
our joys, but that our hopes, cease. 

RlCHTER. 



GEMS. 133 

Gossip is a sort of smoke, that comes from 

the dirty tobacco pipes of those who diffuse 

it; it proves nothing but the bad taste of the 

smoker. 

George Eliot. 

Leaves have their time to fall, 

And flowers to wither at the north-wind's 

breath, 

And stars to set; but all — 

Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O 

Death ! 

Mrs. Hemans. 

Government is a trade which requires 
learning, and to which no one ought to 
aspire who has not learned it. 

Goethe. 

Farewell! a word that hath been and must 
be — 

A sound which makes us linger; yet fare- 
well! 

Byron. 

Revere thyself, and yet thyself despise ; 

His nature no man can o'errate, and none 

Can underrate his merit. 

Young. 



134 GEMS. 

Never part without loving words for your 
loved ones to think of during your absence. 
It may be that you will not meet again in 
this life. 

RlCHTER. 

What do we live for, if not to make life 

less difficult for others? 

George Eliot. 

For forms of government let fools contest; 
Whatever's best administered is best. 
For forms of faith let graceless zealots fight; 
His can't be wrong whose life is in the right. 

Pope. 

O heaven ! were man 

But constant, he were perfect : that one error 

Fills him with faults. 

Shakespeare. 

Be not conformed to this world. 



A stupid person is made glorious by a 

noble deed. 

George Eliot. 

Let a man make errors, but let him be 

genuine, not a mere imitation. 

Goethe. 



GEMS. 135 

We can only have the highest happiness 
by having wide thoughts and as much feeling 
for the rest of the world as for ourselves. 

George Eliot. 

A sorrow's crown of sorrow is 
Remembering happier things. 

Dante. 



Whoso seeketh wisdom shall have no great 
travail; for he shall find her sitting at his 
door. 

To err in modes of prayer may be repre- 
hensible, but not to pray is mad. 

Isaac Taylor. 

Man's love is of man's life a thing apart; 

'Tis woman's whole existence. 

Byron. 

Nurture your mind with great thoughts, for 
to believe in the heroic makes heroes. 

Beaconsfield. 

I think one's whole after life is made easier 

and more blessed by having known what it 

was to have been very poor when one was 

young. 

Miss Mulock. 



136 GEMS. 

Oh, the anguish of that thought, that we 
can never atone to our dead for the stinted 
affection we gave them, for the light answers 
we returned to their plaints or their plead- 
ings, for the little reverence we showed to 
that sacred human soul that lived so close to 
us, and was the divinest thing God had given 

us to know ! 
» George Eliot. 

Honor and shame from no condition rise ; 
Act well your part; there all the honor lies. 

Pope. 

The world moves along not merely by the 
gigantic shoves of its hero-workers, but by 
the aggregate tiny pushes of any honest 
w r orker whatever. All men may give some 
tiny push or other, and feel that they are 
doing something for mankind. 

John Richard Green. 



Tender-handed stroke a nettle, 
It will sting you for your pains ; 
Grasp it, like a man of mettle, 
And it soft as silk remains. 

A. Hill. 



GEMS. 137 

Be kindly affectioned one to another. 



All true work of a man, hang the author 
of it on what gibbet you like, must and will 
accomplish itself. 



Carlyle. 



In thy thriving still misdoubt some evil, 
Lest gaining gain on thee and make thee dim 
To all things else. 



George Herbert. 



We must be as courteous to a man as to a 
picture which we are willing to give the 
advantage of a good light. 



Emerson. 



Though we do nothing, Time keeps his con- 
stant pace, 
And flies as fast in idleness as in employment. 

Feltham. 

Have good-will 

To all that lives, letting unkindness die, 

And greed and wrath ; so that your lives be 

made 

Like soft airs passing by. 

Edwin Arnold. 



138 GEMS. 

God bless all good women. To their soft 

hands and pitying hearts we must all come 

at last. 

O. W. Holmes. 

Every man who has anything really manly 
in his nature knows well that to be a truly 
good father is the utmost dignity to which 
his human nature can attain. 

Miss Mulock. 

One sorrow never comes, butbringsanheir, 
That may succeed as his inheritor. 

Shakespeare. 

If there is any great and good thing in 

store for you, it will not come at the first or 

second call. 

Emerson. 

Desire not to live long, but to live well ; 
How long we live, not years, but actions, tell. 

Watkyns . 



You may set it down as a truth which 
admits of few exceptions, that those who ask 
your opinion really want your praise. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS. 139 

Nice distinctions are troublesome. It is 

much easier to make up your mind that your 

neighbor is good for nothing than to enter 

into all the circumstances which would oblige 

you to modify that opinion. 

George Eliot. 



Some friends as shadows are, 
And Fortune as the sun ; 
They never proffer any help 
Till Fortune hath begun. 

Sir Walter Raleigh. 



Certain books are written, not to instruct 
you, but to let you know that the author knew 
something. 



Goethe. 



Charity 
Lays the rough paths of peevish natures even, 
And opens in each heart a little heaven. 

Prior. 



I could never think well of a man's intel- 
lectual or moral character if he was habitually 
unfaithful to his appointments. 

Emerson. 



140 GEMS. 

The less government we have the better ; 
the fewer laws and the less confided power. 
The antidote to this abuse of formal govern- 
ment is the influence of private character, the 

growth of the individual. 

Emerson. 



Sweet are the rosy memories of the lips 

That first kissed ours, albeit they kiss no 

more. 

Owen Meredith. 



It is mere cowardice to seek safety in ne- 
gations; no character becomes strong in that 
way. 



George Eliot. 



Memory is a net. One finds it full of fish 
when he takes it from the hook, but a dozen 
miles of water have run through it without 
sticking. 



O. W. Holmes. 



The present, the present is all thou hast 

For thy sure possessing; 
Like the patriarch's angel, hold it fast 

Till it gives its blessing. 

Whittier. 



GEMS. 141 

Man cannot make, but may ennoble, fate 

By nobly bearing it. 

Owen Meredith. 



Our moods are lenses coloring the world 

with as many different hues. 

Emerson. 



He that takes himself out of God's hands 

into his own, by and by will not know what 

to do with himself. 

Whichcote. 

If a house be divided against itself, that 
house cannot stand. 



Better not know what we should practise 
than not to practise what we know. 

Quarles. 

The heart that is soonest awake to the flowers 
Is always the first to be touch'd by the thorns. 

Moore. 



Do not despise your situation ; in it you 

must act, suffer, and conquer. From every 

point on earth we are equally near to heaven 

and to the infinite. 

Amiel. 



142 GEMS. 

Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, 

As the swift seasons roll ! 

Leave thy low-vaulted past ! 

Let each new temple, nobler than the last, 

Shut thee from heaven with a dome more 
vast, 

Till thou at length are free, 

Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unrest- 
ing sea. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Be ready always to give an answer to every 
man that asketh you a reason of the hope 
that is in you. 

I much prefer that my life should be of a 
lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than 
that it should be glittering and unsteady. 

Emerson. 

If we are ever in doubt what to do, it is a 
good rule to ask ourselves what we shall wish 
on the morrow we had done. 

Sir John Lubbock. 

Who will not mercie unto others show, 
How can he mercie ever hope to have? 

Spenser. 



GEMS. 143 

The writers against religion, whilst they 

oppose every system, are wisely careful never 

to set up any of their own. 

Edmund Burke. 



All that is at all 

Lasts ever, past recall ; 

Earth changes, but thy soul 

And God stand sure. 

Browning. 

A little philosophy inclineth a man's mind 

to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth 

men's minds about to religion. 

Bacon. 



Once let men see not things alone, but the 
divine light and life that stream through them, 
and then shall every day open new revela- 
tions, then shall the bird upon the wing and 
the flower in the field speak to them of God. 

Dr. Dewey. 

Govern the lips 
As they were palace doors, the king within ; 
Tranquil and fair and courteous be all words 
Which from that presence win. 

Edwin Arnold. 



144 GEMS. 

Rejoice not when thine enemy falleth, and 
let not thine heart be glad when he stumbleth. 



Not in the achievement, but in the endur- 
ance, of the human soul does it show its 
divine grandeur, and its alliance with the 

Infinite God. 

E. H. Chapin. 

He that feeds men serveth few ; 
He serves all who dares to be true. 

Emerson. 

If we find but one to whom we can speak 
out of our heart freely, with whom we can 
walk in love and simplicity without dissimu- 
lation, we have no ground of quarrel with 

the world or God. 

Stevenson. 

Forgive us, Lord, our little faith; 
And help us all, from morn till e'en, 
Still to believe that lot is best 
Which is — not that which might have been. 

G. Z. Gray. 

If any man be in Christ, he is a new 
creature. 



GEMS. 145 

Happy is the man whom God correcteth. 



It is impossible for that man to despair 
who remembers that his Helper is omnipo- 
tent. . 

Jeremy Taylor. 

Let us be content in work 

To do the thing we can, and not presume 

To fret because it's little. 

Mrs. Browning. 



We spoil everything by hurry. We are 
wearing ourselves out as a nation by our 
hurry and intensity — too eager to get a 
living to be willing to stop to live. 

Osgood. 

I count this thing to be grandly true — 
That a noble deed is a step toward God, 
Lifting the soul from a common sod 
To a clearer air a^id a broader view. 

T. W. Parsons. 



One ought never to speak of the faults of 
one's friends : it mutilates them. They can 
never be the same afterwards. 

W. D. Howells. 



146 GEMS. 

Paradise is always where love dwells. 

RlCHTER. 



You are not to play the whole play ; 
You have only your own cues to mind. 

Mrs. Whitney. 



If you are slandered, never mind it; it will 
all come off when it is dry. 

President Finney. 



Men are tattooed with their especial beliefs, 

like so many South Sea Islanders ; but a real 

human heart, with Divine love in it, beats 

with the same glow under all the patterns of 

all earth's thousand tribes. 

O. W. Holmes. 



Wiser it were to welcome and make ours 
Whate'er of good, though small, the present 

brings, 
Kind greetings, sunshine, songs of birds, and 

flowers, 
With a child's pure delight in little things. 

R. C. Trench. 



Fear not, I am the first and I am the last. 



GEMS. 147 

I know life's too short for querrellin' ; it's 
too short, too, fer makm' over some folks. 

Mrs. Whitney. 



What seems to us affliction 

Is oft a hand that helps us to our wish. 

Sheridan Knowles. 



The man who truly loves, loves humbly, 
and fears not that another may be preferred, 
but that another may be worthier of prefer- 
ence than himself. 

Miss Mulock. 



Once o'er this painful earth a man did move, 
The Man of Griefs, because the Man of Love. 
The wine of love can be obtained of none 
Save him who trod the wine-press all alone. 

Trench. 

Both riches and honor come of thee. 



The whole essence of true gentle breeding 
(one does not like to say gentility) lies in 
the wish and the art to be agreeable. Good 
breeding is surface Christianity. 

O. W. Holmes. 



148 GEMS. 

There are more quarrels smothered by just 

shutting your mouth, and holding it shut, than 

by all the wisdom in the world. 

Beecher. 



Life may bring to you every good 
Which from a Father's hand can fall; 
But if true lips have said to me, 
" I love you," I have known it all ! 

Phcebe Cary. 

To sit as a passive bucket, and be pumped 

into, whether you consent or not, can in the 

long run be exhilarating to no creature, how 

eloquent soever the flood of utterance that is 

ascending. 

Carlyle. 



Happy, happier far than thou, 
With the laurel on thy brow, 
She that makes the humblest hearth 
Lovely but to one on earth. 

Mrs. Hemans. 

Experience keeps a dear school, but fools 
will learn in no other. If you do not hear 
Reason, she will rap your knuckles. 

Franklin. 



GEMS. 149 

He filleth the hungry soul with goodness. 



The golden moments in the stream of life 
rush past us, and we see nothing but the 
sand ; the angels come to visit us, and we 
only know them when they are gone. 

George Eliot. 

Grief is a tattered tent, 

Wherethrough God's light doth shine. 

Who glances up at every rent 

Shall catch a ray divine. 

Lucy Larcom. 



The burden of suffering seems a tomb- 
stone hung about our necks, while in reality 
it is only the weight which is necessary to 
keep down the diver while he is hunting for 
pearls. 

RlCHTER. 



There are nettles everywhere, 

But smooth green grasses are more common 

still ; 
The blue of heaven is larger than the cloud. 

Mrs. Browning. 



My heart trusted in him, and I am helped. 



150 GEMS. 

Be a lamp in the chamber if you cannot 

be a star in the sky. 

George Eliot. 



Enthusiasm is essential to the successful 
attainment of any high endeavor. 



A. Bronson Alcott. 



Whoever has received, on him there is an 

inexorable behest to give. Fais ton fats. 

Do thy little stroke of work ; this is Nature's 

voice, and the sum of all the commandments 

to each man. 

Carlyle. 

We measure success by accumulation. 
The measure is false. The true measure is 
appreciation. He who loves most has most. 

Henry Van Dyke. 



He married for love (pure), the only rea- 
son that anyone, man or woman, ought to 
dare to marry. 



Miss Mulock. 



No life is so strong and complete, 
But it yearns for the smile of a friend. 

Wallace Bruce. 



GEMS. 151 

By strength shall no man prevail. 



It is not from the tall, crowded warehouse 
of prosperity that men first or clearest see 
the eternal stars of heaven. It is often from 
the humble spot where we have laid down 
our dear ones that we find our best observ- 
atory, which gives us glimpses into the far- 
off world of never-ending time. 

Theodore Parker. 



They alone have need of sorrow, 
And they alone are poor, 
For whom in life Love's holy angel 
Hath opened not her door. 

Mary Clemmer. 

The government shall be upon his shoulder. 



Doing nothing for others is the undoing 
of one's self. We must be purposely kind 
and generous, or we miss the best part of 
existence. The heart that goes out of itself 
gets large and full of joy. This is the great 
secret of the inner life. We do ourselves 
the most good doing something for others. 

Horace Mann. 



152 GEMS. 

Far away there in the sunshine are my 
highest aspirations. I cannot reach them, 
but I can look up and see their beauty, believe 
in them, and try to follow where they lead. 

Miss Alcott. 

It isn't the thing you do, dear, 
It's the thing you leave undone, 
Which gives you a bit of a heartache 
At the setting of the sun. 

Margaret Sangster. 



Only what we have wrought into our 

character can we take with us to the other 

world. 

Humboldt. 

Weeping for a night alone endureth, 
God at last shall bring a morning hour ; 
In the frozen buds of every winter 
Sleep the blossoms of a future flower. 

Mrs. Stowe. 

All the doors that lead inward to the secret 

place of the Most High are doors outward 

— out of self, out of smallness, out of 

wrong. 

George Macdonald. 



GEMS. 153 

The life is more than meat, and the body 
is more than raiment. 



Only the present is thy part and fee, 

And happy thou 
If, though thou didst not beat thy future 
brow, 
Thou couldst well see 
What present things required of thee. 

George Herbert. 



Shall not the Judge of all the earth do 
right? 

Friends should not only live in harmony, 

but in melody. 

Thoreau. 



Blessings are not free ; they do not fall 

In listless hands ; by toil the soul must prove 

Its steadfast purpose master over all. 

Bayard Taylor. 



Reputation is what men and women think 

of us ; character is what God and angels 

know of us. 

Thomas Paine. 



154 GEMS. 

It is astonishing how soon the whole con- 
science begins to unravel if a single stitch 
drops ; one single sin indulged in makes a 
hole you could put your head through. 

Charles Buxton. 



I sent my soul through the Invisible, 

Some letter of that after-life to spell; 

And by and by my soul returned to me, 

And answered, " I myself am Heaven and 

Hell." 

Omar Khayyam. 



It is the easiest thing in the world to invent 
a new religion ; any fool can do that. It is 
a thousand times easier to invent a new 
religion than to live up to the old one. 

R. J. BURDETTE. 

Love is ever busy with his shuttle, 
Is ever weaving into life's dull warp 
Bright gorgeous flowers and scenes Arcadian, 
Hanging our gloomy prison-house about 
With tapestries, that make its walls dilate 
In never-ending vistas of delight. 

Longfellow. 



GEMS. I 5 5 

Teach me to do thy will, for thou art my 
God. 

Christ awakened the world's thought, and 

it has never slept since. 

Howard. 



The unspoken word never does harm. 

Kossuth. 

Great is the tailor, but not the greatest. 

Carlyle. 

" Nothing ever suits her. She ain't had no 
more troubles to bear than the rest of us ; 
but you never see her that she didn't have a 
chapter to lay before ye. I've got as much 
feeling as the next one ; but when folks 
drives in their spiggits and wants to draw a 
bucketful o' compassion every day, right 
straight along, there does come times when 
it seems as if the bar'l was getting low." 

Sarah Orne Jewett. 



Knowledge by suffering entereth, 
And life is perfected by death. 



Mrs. Browning. 



I have loved thee with an everlasting love. 



156 GEMS. 

I am forced to wink a little, for fear of 

seeing too much, for a neighborly man must 

let himself be cheated a little. 

George Eliot. 



The world knows nothing of its greatest 

men. 

Sir Henry Taylor. 



One only need to grow older in order to 
grow tolerant. I have seen no fault com- 
mitted which I might not have committed 
myself. 



Goethe. 



Kind hearts are here, yet would the tenderest 

one 
Have limits to its mercy : God has none. 

Adelaide Procter. 



Ignorance is a blank sheet on which we 
may write ; but error is a scribbled one from 
which we must erase. 

COLTON. 

Though creeds are narrow, know that 

truth is wide. 

Elaine Goodale. 



GExMS. 157 

As for God, his way is perfect. 



I think the first virtue is to restrain the 
tongue. He is nearest to the gods who 
knows how to be silent, even though he is in 
the right. 



Cato. 



Truth is the property of no individual, but 

is the treasure of all men. 

Emerson. 

Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control, 
These three alone lead life to sovereign power. 

Tennyson. 

God is known just as much as he is loved. 

Bernard. 

Happiness stands like a maid at your gate : 

Why should you think you will find her 

by roving? 

Never was greater mistake than to hate — 

Try loving. 

John Esten Cooke. 



Love one human being purely and warmly, 
and you will love all. 

RlCHTER. 



158 GEMS. 

His compassions fail not. 



I thank thee, Almighty God, that thou 
hast produced no second edition of this man ! 
Goethe. 

All men, if they work not as in a Great 
Task-Master's eye, will work wrong, work 
unhappily for themselves and you. 

Carlyle. 



The Moving Finger writes ; and, having writ, 
Moves on ; nor all your Piety nor Wit 
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, 
Nor all your Tears wash out a word of it. 

Omar Khayyam. 



Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose 
mind is stayed on thee. 



That is the best government which desires 
to make the people happy and knows how to 
make them happy. 



Macaulay. 



Because right is right, to follow right 
Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence. 

Tennyson. 



GEMS. 159 

The eternal stars shine out as soon as it is 

dark enough. 

Carlyle. 



The man who cannot wonder, who does 
not habitually wonder and worship, is but a 
pair of spectacles behind which there is no 
eye. 



Carlyle. 



Ill that he blesses is our good, 

And unblest good is ill. 

And all is right that seems most wrong 

If it be his sweet will. 

Faber. 

It is good that a man should both hope 
and quietly wait. 



No book that will not improve by repeated 

Carlyle. 



readings deserves to be read at all. 



All as God wills, who wisely heeds 
To give or to withhold, 
And knoweth more of all my needs 
Than all my prayers have told, 

Whittier. 



l6o GEMS. 

At evening home is the best place for a 

man. 

Goethe. 

The block of granite which was an obstacle 
in the pathway of the weak becomes a step- 
ping-stone in the pathway of the strong. 

Carlyle. 

An open foe may prove a curse, 
But a pretended friend is worse. 

Gay. 

The world is so fruitful that we can hardly 

even blunder without bringing forth some 

good. 

Beecher. 



How would you be, 

If he, which is the top of judgment, should 

But judge you as you are ? O think on that, 

And mercy then will breathe within your lips, 

Like man new made, 

Shakespeare. 

Flowers are the beautiful hieroglyphics of 
Nature, with which she indicates how much 
she loves us. 

Goethe. 



GEMS. l6l 

Thy faithfulness is unto all generations. 



Unlimited good-humor is one of the chief 
requisites of all good government, whether of 
one's self, a nursery, or a country. 

Mrs. L. Ormiston Chant. 



The year's at the spring, and day's at the 

morn, 
Morning's at seven, the hillside's dew-pearled, 
The lark's on the wing, the snail's on the 

thorn, 
God's in his heaven, all's right with the world. 

Robert Browning. 



A child should be taught the manly art of 
patience, often more difficult to practise than 
that of pugilism. 



Marion Harland. 



One kindly deed may turn 

The fountain of thy soul 

To Love's sweet day-star that shall o'er thee 

burn 

Long as its currents roll ! 

O. W. Holmes. 



l62 GEMS. 

His commandments are not grievous. 



Never forget what a man has said to you 
when he was angry. If he has charged you 
with anything, look it up ; anger is a bow 
that will shoot sometimes when another feel- 
ing will not. 

Beecher. 



It fortifies my soul to know 

That though I perish Truth is so, — 

That howsoe'er I stray and range, 

Whate'er I do, thou dost not change. 

I steadier step when I recall 

That if I slip, thou dost not fall ! 

Arthur Hugh Clough. 



Receive not the grace of God in vain. 



Look on every day as the whole of life, not 
merely as a section, and enjoy the present 
without wishing, through haste, to spring on 
to another lying before the section. 



RlCHTER. 



Hope springs eternal in the human breast, — 
Man never is, but always to be blest. 



Pope. 



GEMS. 163 

If we will take the good we find, asking no 
questions, we shall have heaping measures. 
The great gifts are not got by analysis. 

Carlyle. 



They who go 
Feel not the pain of parting ; it is they 
Who stay behind that suffer. 

Longfellow. 



Him that cometh, I will in no wise cast 
out. 



That is the true season of love when we 
believe that we alone can love, that no one 
could ever have loved so before us, and that 
no one will love in the same way after us. 

Goethe. 



Great gifts can be given by little hands, 
Since of all gifts, Love is still the best. 

Adelaide Procter. 



For every grain of wit there is a grain of 
folly. For everything you have missed you 
have gained something else. 



Emerson. 



1 64 GEMS. 

We judge ourselves by what we feel capa- 
ble of doing, while others judge us by what 
we have already done. 

Longfellow. 

Time is the judge; Time has no friend or 

foe; 

False fame must wither and the true must 

grow. 

Young. 



One can neither protect or arm himself 
against criticism. We must meet it defiantly, 
and thus gradually please it. 

Goethe. 

Every noble crown is, and on earth will 
forever be, a crown of thorns. 

Carlyle. 



Writing or printing is like shooting with a 

rifle : you may hit your reader's mind or miss 

it ; — but talking is like playing at a mark 

with the pipe of an engine : if it is within 

reach, and you have time enough, you can't 

help hitting it. 

O. W. Holmes. 



GEMS, 165 

That which I see not, teach thou me. 



He that hath light in his own clear breast, 

May sit i' the centre and enjoy bright day : 

But he that hides a dark soul and foul 

thoughts, 

Benighted walks under the mid-day sun : 

Himself is his own dungeon. 

Milton. 



In everything ye are enriched by him. 



Pleasures of high flavor, like pineapples, 
have the misfortune that, like pineapples, 
they make the gums bleed. 



RlCHTER. 



Study yourselves, and, most of all, note well 
Wherein kind Nature meant you to excel. 

Longfellow. 



A mother and a dog are the only two 
things in the world that seem to have abso- 
lutely disinterested love. 



Beecher. 



He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of 
silver. 



1 66 GEMS. 

The greatest of all faults, I should say, is 

to be conscious of none. 

Carlyle. 



Labor for some or other end 
Is lord and master of us all. 

Lord Houghton. 



We may outrun 
By violent swiftness that which we run at, 
And lose by overrunning. 



Shakespeare. 



Poor women ! they have always to carry 
and hold the Jacob's ladder by which we 
men ascend into the blue and sunset skies. 

RlCHTER. 



If we could read the secret history of our 
enemies, we would find in each man's life 
sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all 
our hostility. 



Longfellow. 



There is a deep nick in Time's restless wheel 

For each man's good, when which nick 

comes, it strikes. 



Chapman. 



GEMS. 167 

How is it that ye have no faith ? 



A reproach of our poverty, uttered by lips 
we have loved, darts like red-hot iron into 
the heart, and scorches it dry with fire. 

RlCHTER. 



Men deal with life as children with their 

play, 
Who first misuse, then cast their toys away. 

COWPER. 



The little that is done seems nothing, 
when we look forward and see how much 
w r e have yet to do. 

Goethe. 



The eyes of the blind shall be opened, and 
the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. 



( 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



ill 



ii mm* 



027 249 700 A 



